The upcoming One Bangkok development in Thailand is a fully integrated district located opposite Lumphini Park in the heart of the city. It will comprise five grade A office towers, five luxury hotels, three residential complexes, multiple retail zones and an area dedicated for arts and culture.

With a total gross floor area of 1.83 mil sq m, One Bangkok is believed to be the largest private sector property development initiative ever undertaken in Thailand. It features high accessibility and smart city innovation, and is expected to set new benchmarks in design, quality and sustainability. The 16.7 ha ‘city-within- a-city’ development also provides 8 ha of public space, including a 10,000 sq m landscaped civic plaza, and will form a new urban centre for the city of more than 10 million inhabitants when completed in 2025.

Thai Bauer Co Ltd, the local subsidiary of Bauer Spezialtiefbau GmbH, was commissioned as part of the large-scale project by developers Frasers Property and TCC Assets to undertake the foundation work for the buildings and execution of the diaphragm wall. In total, around 700 bored piles with diameters of 1,500 and 1,800 mm down to a depth of 80 m are to be installed, along with a diaphragm wall with a total length of 466 m and a depth of 35 m.

For this job, Bauer BG 45, BG 40, BG 28 and GB 60 grabs are being used. Besides the permanent foundation works, Thai Bauer was also tasked with the preliminary pile load tests. These tests served to inspect the planned foundation for its load-bearing capacity and enabled the optimisation of the design by the client.

According to Bauer, the biggest challenge faced by the company is the location of the project, which is right in the middle of pulsating downtown Bangkok. This means that each day the total quantity of excavated soil must be transported away from the construction site by trucks, subject to traffic and city regulations restricting operating times. In order to avoid delays and keep all adjoining roads free of contamination, Bauer decided to install special tyre washing facilities on site.

Besides handling logistics for the removal of the excavated soil, the constant supply of the construction site with concrete and steel for the bored piles must also be ensured. To minimise the impact of the construction activity on nearby road traffic, concrete batching plants have been set up on the construction site, said Bauer. This allows the company to continue working regardless of the traffic flow. At peak times, around 1,000 cu m of excavated soil will be removed daily and up to 850 cu m of concrete directly processed.

The project is being carried out according to LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) platinum level. The foundation works began in March 2018, with completion scheduled by April 2019. The entire development is planned to be completed in phases from 2022 to 2025.

Website: www.bauer.com