The UK’s leading precast concrete manufacturer, Bison Manufacturing, has received the third in a trio of appointments to provide its units for use in the construction of a new car storage area at the UK’s busiest vehicle handling port.
Brought on board by Morgan Sindall Construction and Infrastructure Ltd, Bison will manufacture and deliver 84,000m2 of its 150mm deep Hollowcore units which will be utilised in the creation of Deck 7 at the Port of Southampton, the largest multi-deck car storage area on the site.
The appointment follows the recent announcement that end client Associated British Ports (ABP) is investing £50m in its vehicle handling facilities at the location, with Deck 7 being one of two new multi-storey structures which, together, will be able to store more than 7,500 vehicles for export.
The order is Bison’s third for the project, with the company having also provided its units for Deck 5 and a subsequent larger extension. Prior to this, both Morgan Sindall and ABP visited Bison’s Swadlincote manufacturing facility in Derbyshire to assess its production process and quality control measures, as Paul Finch, Contracts Manager at Morgan Sindall explains: “As the UK’s busiest vehicle handling port it’s vital that Southampton continues to meet growing demand and supports the British automotive industry.
"In order to ensure that the project goes to schedule we wanted to be certain that Bison could provide the required level of both quality and capacity in order to deliver the best possible units for the task in line with our installation programme.
“Having visited the Swadlincote facility we’re more than confident in Bison’s abilities, and have already worked with them in the construction of other car decks on site.”
Mike Nelson, Sales & Commercial Manager at Bison Manufacturing added: “Bison is continuously investing in developing its production facilities to provide our clients with the best products. We were able to demonstrate to Morgan Sindall and ABP that we could not only meet their production requirements in terms of quantity and delivery within the required timeframes, but that we were able to consistently manufacture high quality units thanks to our stringent quality control procedures.
“For projects such as this it’s important to control differential camber between adjacent units. The stringent quality control measures we have in place ensure the Clients requirements are achieved.”
The units are scheduled for delivery beginning in January 2017, with final handover to the client expected at the end of November 2017.
