Cawarden demolishes former NHS buildings within a live hospital environment to create a new car park at the Queen’s Hospital in Burton.

Cawarden was contracted to demolish four double-storey buildings situated at 326 Belvedere Road and 1-6 Outwoods Close. The purpose of the demolition was to make room for a new car park at the Queen’s Hospital in Burton.

Located on the live hospital site, the scope of works firstly involved the asbestos removal and soft strip of the vacant NHS buildings, including former housing for NHS staff. The soft strip of the buildings included the removal of furniture, fixtures, pipework and sanitary fittings. All of this was separated into different waste streams to maximise recycling.

To clear the site safely and efficiently, the primary method of demolition was controlled using our demolition excavators from our in-house fleet. The brick/blockwork structures with timber roofs were systematically demolished in a bay-by-bay strategy to ensure the buildings were always safe and stable.

Excavators also removed all hardstandings and foundations as well as removing any ducts and underground pipework.

It was crucial to work with consideration and cause as little disturbance as possible to hospital patients, teaching facilities, and residential properties. Therefore, dust, noise, and vibration monitoring were carried out daily as part of our duty of care. This was done throughout the main works and when crushing operations were taking place.

We processed all hard materials on-site and crushed them down to 6f2 using our mobile crusher. The clean hardcore was then utilised to make the site level and create a gently sloping surface. This not only helped in recycling the material but also reduced vehicle movements coming in and out of the hospital site. The entire area of the site was backfilled, compacted and levelled by following the existing site contours. This helped us to create a new firm hardstanding in readiness for the final tarmac layer.

Finally, existing vegetation and old fencing were removed to create new entrance routes. We also installed new kerbs, external LED lighting, and boundary fencing to complete the work on the new hospital car park.