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The Princess Royal heralds sport for all in Boston | 2 Nov 2004 |
Boston in Lincolnshire is not the first place one would think of as the site for a forward-looking, fully accessible sports training facility but the new Princess Royal Sports Arena combines a competition arena with state of the art training facilities. What makes it so special is that it is an inclusive project, designed from the drawing board to accommodate and encourage participation for both the able-bodied and those with all levels of disabilities. The intention is for it to provide a sports facility on a regional and even a national level for all sorts of sports people, while also providing facilities for the local community – whether it be the rugby and athletics clubs that were the cornerstone of the development – or people in Boston who want to use the fully equipped leisure centre.
The Princess Royal Sports Arena – Phase One was opened by HRH The Princess Royal – is also a showcase for the use of engineered timber from international forest products company Finnforest, the UK’s leading supplier of timber products and engineered timber solutions. Finnforest is the area’s biggest commercial employer and so it is only fitting that it became heavily involved with the development of the sports facility that not only is innovative in terms of its remit but also imaginative in both appearance and in its engineering.
The complex, which is being constructed in stages, comprises three pavilions: a fitness suite with a swimming pool, aerobics studio and gym, an indoor training centre with surfaces for indoor athletics and rugby training; and a club house, with a bar. Externally, there is a fully equipped athletics facility and a number of rugby pitches.
One feature of the location is that it is flat, but also overlain with peat, so that it was necessary to pile down about 12m to find a solid footing. The architect, BGP McConaghy Architects, was appointed after PGA Management took over the project, running it as a construction-management project. It started with an economic feasibility study since a previous design had far outstripped the available funding. This study showed that an affordable, if perhaps mundane, centre could be built within budget.
Thankfully Finnforest came up with an offer of the sponsored supply of timber materials that form the integral fabric of the whole construction, with the result that the entire concept changed – for the better. An architect with considerable experience of sports facilities was appointed and, working with Finnforest, succeeded in incorporating a wide range of engineered wood elements without making the building look like an experiment in wood technology.
Moreover Finnforest’s input resulted in wood being widely used not only externally but internally too – indeed almost everywhere – such that the resulting buildings have a warmer, more intimate aesthetic than one would expect from such a facility.
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Finnforest UK
The Heights
59/65 Lowlands Road
Harrow on the Hill, Middlesex
HA1 3AE
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Finnforest also assisted with the engineering expertise, both in terms of structural design and fabrication and timber engineers from Finland were employed to work on the project. However, the structural engineer, Finnmap Oy, had to take account of different climatic conditions, so while there was no need to design for heavy Scandinavian snowfalls, wind loading for the Lincolnshire site had to be twice the Finnish level.
Although it was initially envisaged that that raw materials be imported and fabricated on site, it turned out to be much more economic to bring pre-fabricated elements direct from Finland. For example, the hollow-cored multi-faceted Laminated Veneer Lumber (LVL) columns were manufactured in Finnforest’s Lahti plant, which meant the considerable quality control necessary on the gluing process could be carried out with confidence.
Solid LVL roof beams spanning up to 22m and weighing about 2.25 tonnes each were also imported direct from Finland. The design encorporates a central glazed ‘street’, there curved Glulam beams have been used. These are then glazed with a polymer sheet, with 20% opacity to let light in but also to prevent the area from becoming a suntrap. The second phase, which has already begun, involves the use of Glulam beams spanning over 30m to create the main roof structure. These again will remain exposed to add to the aesthetic qualities of the construction.
Externally the building is clad in ThermoWood, Finnforest’s heat-treated timber product that gains its hardness and durability, as well as darkening, through the heat treatment process. Although no surface treatment was necessary, the ThermoWood has also been coated in a light oak wood stain to darken it a little further, in keeping with the overall aesthetics of the development. The rest of the external cladding, used at a higher level, is external-grade ply finished in a lighter coloured stain.
The aerobics studio has timber-clad walls and a soffit of Finnish softwood. It has a sprung laminated floor that uses the properties of the timber elements to provide the ‘bounce’, rather than needing to support the floor on springs. This consists of an oak veneer on a laminboard of timber boarding on ply. It is the precise composition of this sandwich that provides the desired flexibility.
Stand back a couple of meters and the overall impression is of a building on a formerly featureless site that is contemporary, warm and looks eminently fit for its purpose. If it succeeds in its aim of attracting major disabled sporting events, it will be a victory both for the people of Boston and for Finnforest, which has managed to realise so much of its innovative-engineered timber products into the final design.
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