Client: Barts and the Royal London Hospitals
Type of works: around 75,000m2 of Tarkett flooring has been installed so far
Tarkett has been specified to supply new flooring to two of the country’s oldest hospitals. Barts and the Royal London are currently undergoing a 10-year, £1 billion redevelopment that will replace many of their ageing buildings with state-of-the-art healthcare facilities, and around 75,000m2 of Tarkett flooring has been installed so far.
Excellent lifecycle costs and ease of maintenance were essential requirements for the flooring in the general corridors and rooms. Tarkett’s iQ Eminent is specifically designed for such heavy-duty commercial applications, being made with high quality raw materials and offering outstanding performance. It needs no wax or polish for life, just simple dry buffing, thanks to a 3rd generation PUR surface treatment. Maintenance costs can be reduced by up to 30% compared with traditional cleaning methods. The reduced use of water and chemicals is also a powerful environmental consideration.
A variety of other Tarkett flooring has also been installed to meet specific needs, such as Safetred Universal safety flooring for wet areas at staff rests. Providing sustainable R10 slip resistance, Safetred Universal features Safety Clean PUR to ensure greater resistance to soiling and stains, whilst offering low cost, easy maintenance. Tarkett’s Tapiflex Excellence 65 provided an acoustic flooring solution for the busy womens’ and childrens’ waiting and play areas, featuring a high density foam backing with closed cells to give unequaled sound reduction and shock absorbency. It also has a built-in Sanitized treatment to protect the flooring from premature ageing caused by microorganisms, giving extra hygiene benefits to sensitive areas, such as hospitals.
As one of the country’s leading green project developers and contractors, Skanska set some ambitious environmental targets for this project. Nick Baker, Skanska’s Environmental Manager explains: “To build green projects we need a green supply chain. The durability of the Tarkett product, together with the closed-loop recycling of the material off-cuts back into the manufacturing process, marks this out as a sustainable solution in tune with Skanska’s Deep Green ambitions.”
Barts Hospital poses a particular logistical challenge thanks to its city centre location and the fact the new building fills the entire footprint of the site. An off-site logistics depot is being used to consolidate materials from all suppliers, reducing daily deliveries to site. Certain material off-cuts are also returned from site to the depot, where they are stored prior to collection for recycling. Segregation of waste on site was essential to ensure all installation waste and off-cuts were recycled, and Tarkett worked closely with Skanska and the flooring contractor to achieve this.