The BeethamHilton Tower is a 48-storey hotel and residential development in the centre of Manchester. It features a slender glass tower surmounted by a glass ‘blade’, which takes the full height of the building to 171 m.
WSP is providing all the engineering services for the building, including structural, building services, fire and environmental engineering.
Structural design ensures realisation of architect’s vision
Working closely with the architect, our structural engineers have made possible the slender design, which incorporates a 4 m cantilever at level 23, providing an interesting line to the façade.
The building comprises a tower housing the apartments and hotel bedrooms, which is a post-tensioned concrete frame structure, adjacent to a five-storey steel framed ‘podium’ containing the hotel ballroom, restaurants and bars with a plant room above.
Added value through innovative and efficient design
Efficient design allowed costs to be controlled and managed, enabling the developer to achieve the maximum value from the site. Examples of this include:
- Storey depth trusses across the plant room create a 16 m clear span over the ballroom and the elimination of transfer structure which would normally be required due to the complex requirements of the different uses of the podium.
- The foundation design, using a raft instead of piles, delivered a significant cost saving.
- A combined heat and power plant (CHP) provides energy efficiency solutions to the iconic, fully glazed façade. Heat produced as a result of on-site power generation is used for domestic hot water and electricity, thus helping to resolve compliance with Part L regulations relating to energy conservation.
- Innovative fire engineering techniques offer significant cost savings as well as important life safety benefits. These include a 50% reduction in the number of escape cores in the main building and a unique risk-based method of analysis which eliminates the need for fire protection of the steel structure in the podium.
Awards
The Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH) selected the Beetham Hilton Tower as the Best International Tall Building at their 2007 CTBUH Annual Awards
Project information
Client: Beetham Organisation Limited
Project size: 171 m high, 48 storeys
Project value: £55M excluding fit out
Status: completed end 2006