Multiplex has reached a major construction milestone on La Trobe University’s $100 million student accommodation project at its Bundoora campus, topping out the mass timber twin building development.
This project is the largest mass timber construction project currently underway in Victoria, with the entire development utilising a full cross-laminated timber (CLT) and glulam structure.
Designed by JCB Architects to be highly sustainable, the project will deliver an additional 624 beds across two separate buildings linked by common amenities and landscaping. When complete it will bring the total number of beds on campus to 2,150.
Multiplex Regional Managing Director Graham Cottam said this is an innovative project which links with the company’s passion for sustainable design technologies
“We are thrilled to utilise mass timber and be the largest new development in Victoria doing so. Student accommodation combines our skills in delivering quality residential developments with our experience in working in busy, live education environments,” Mr Cottam said.
Around 150 workers are on-site every day and over 2,700 mass timber elements have been used in construction so far.
Complexities on-site include the project taking place within a busy operating university campus with rigorous scheduling, and use of mass timber fast-tracking construction while minimising impact to the learning environment.
Other innovative construction techniques include the use of pod bathrooms and prefabricated concrete, making the construction on campus as quick as possible.
Harnessing new construction technology across the site, the building design incorporates innovative, sustainable and environmental features, with most of the existing trees being preserved in the placement and shape of the buildings. Meanwhile the use of mass timber has the capacity to halve the embodied carbon in the building relative to a concrete structure.
The accommodation is part of the La Trobe University’s $5 billion plan to transform its Bundoora campus into a University City of the Future.
The student accommodation is scheduled for completion in July, 2020 and students beginning their studies in the second semester of 2020 will be able to move into the new accommodation.