Winnersh Triangle office car park deck gets an upgrade

An office car park in the Winnersh Triangle has been upgraded 17 years after it opened by the same contractor using the same materials. The car park at 200 Berkshire Place serves offices occupied by tenants including Sage and Amdocs. 

When erected in 2000, contractor Cemplas protected the top deck of the car park using the Tretodek, Tremco’s polyurethane (PU) waterproofing system. 

After almost two decades’ service the system was starting to show its age and the landlord wanted a new 10-year warranted system. Fidelity appointed Resolute Property Consultancy to specify a replacement system and supervise its application.  

During the period since the original application, tremco illbruck has undergone a re-branding and its products had evolved. The Tretodek had been replaced by a new Tremco PU system. However, because the original system was felt to have performed well beyond its original design life, Resolute founder and partner, Mark Goulding, contacted tremco illbruck and spoke to sales manager Peter Bitten for advice. 

“The old Tretodek system has a 10-year warranty and had reached the end of its natural life without anything but the most basic maintenance, so it had done pretty well,” said Bitten. “But it had been installed on a new-build. The car park is now in constant use and there was no possibility of closing it for any length of time.”

For this reason, Bitten recommended a fast-curing MMA (methylmethacrylate) waterproofing system on the basis that the rapid curing properties would allow a quick turnaround with minimum disruption.

An invitation to tender was raised to strip out and replace the system and Cemplas was appointed, seeing it return to the site. Cemplas is one of tremco illbruck’s longest serving approved applicator partners. To limit disruption to the offices’ employees a traffic management plan was developed. This saw the top deck waterproofing system replaced in two sections, allowing half the spaces to remain in use at all times. The two ramps up to the roof had to be kept operational when the car park was in use, so these were treated during a weekend possession and returned to full use, with their new waterproofing system applied, on a Monday morning.

“MMA chemistry is ideal for this sort of project,” said Peter Bitten. “When you have a limited window or there’s a risk of interruption, by the weather, for example, MMA allows you to complete a layer quickly. The MMA formulation also has the advantage over other systems of allowing a partial application that can be left for completion at a later date. With other systems, once the product has cured, subsequent layers don’t bond well. With MMA, each layer fuses with the one below, even after it has cured. 

"PU systems are still widely used, but with a job like this MMA really comes into its own. MMA technology attracts a premium over PU but the advantage of rapid application and minimal disruption often means it is more cost-effective in the long run.”