In November last, BAM Building Ltd won the Public Building Project of the Year award at the 2019 Irish Building and Design Awards for its work on the Cork Court House. Project Manager Will Leahy spoke to Building Ireland about the ins and outs of the project and the honour in picking up the accolade.
Last November saw BAM Building Ltd successful in four different categories at the annual Irish Building and Design Awards.
The company’s work on the Cork Courthouse in 2017 and 2018 saw the €35million redevelopment earning the award for Public Building of the Year.
Project Manager Will Leahy, who has been BAM Building Ltd for 20 years now, told Building Ireland all about the project in the weeks after the award success.
“Cork Courthouse was one of the eight applications BAM put forward for the Irish Building and Design and Awards and it was a €35million redevelopment,” explained Leahy, a graduate of Waterford Institute of Technology.
“What the project entailed was a revamp of the former Model School building on Anglesea Street and the construction of a new six-storey courthouse that provides six new courtrooms and improved custody and legal practitioner facilities.
“There are now six court rooms, judge’s chambers, legal practitioner facilities, a jury assembly area and a large public area.”
BAM started the project in January 2017 and handed it over in April 2018, with the new build’s concrete frame finished with Irish Limestone and the courtrooms finished with European Oak.
All in all, the Cork Courthouse is one of seven courthouses that BAM has restored, renovated and built across Ireland as part of the Courts Bundle PPP project, the deal also provides for the 25-year facility management of each courthouse.
It has been developed around the original structure, which was built circa 1865, and has expanded the site’s area size from 1,815m2 to 10,100m2.
It was designed to incorporate Court Services offices, training rooms, Garda and DPP facilities also.
As a Co Cork native, Leahy himself was delighted to be part of the project and equally as happy to see its success for the company come ‘awards season’ at the end of last year.
Operating from bases in Kildare (HQ), Cork and Galway, BAM Ireland is a wholly owned subsidiary of Royal BAM Group of the Netherlands and covers the entire spectrum of construction in Ireland.
It is the holding company for all BAM’s operating companies in Ireland, which include; BAM Building; BAM Civil; BAM Fit-out; BAM Property; BAM Housing; BAM PPP; BAM Facilities Management and BAM Rail.
Together, the above operating companies rank in the ‘Top 2’ of major Irish construction companies.
BAM Ireland employs over 2,700 people directly and indirectly and its turnover for 2018 was at a whopping €524million.
BAM Building has carried out projects of the largest scale for the most prestigious of clients. BAM Civil is the largest civil engineering contractor in Ireland and its projects include PPP motorway schemes, transportation, water & wastewater, marine, energy and rail projects.
To this day, BAM continues to be active in the Irish PPP market and has already successfully delivered eight projects to date:
In joint venture with sister company BAM international, BAM Ireland is currently working on The Museum of the Future in Dubai. Other JV projects completed in the Middle East include: Hazza Bin Zayed Stadium & Mixed-use Development, Abu Dhabi; Phase 1 of Terminal Four at Jebel Ali Port in Dubai and the Aqaba New LNG Terminal.
BAM Ireland is certified to ISO 45001:2018 for Occupational Health & Safety Management, ISO 9001:2015 for Quality Management and ISO 14001: 2015 for Environmental Management.
It has been the company’s mission to create sustainable environments that enhance people’s lives by enabling the right people to capitalise on state-of-the-art knowledge, resources and digital technologies, providing solutions across the total construction lifecycle for the Group’s clients and generating maximum value for its stakeholders.
The vision for BAM was that by 2020 the Group would be recognised as one of Europe’s leading sustainable and innovative construction businesses, with healthy profits and a strong balance sheet, active across the total construction lifecycle in its European home markets and in selected growing economies around the world.
All things considered, it’s safe to say that the vision for the company has now become a reality.
Last year, BAM Ireland submitted applications in eight categories for the Irish Building and Design and Awards.
Held at the Clayton Hotel in Dublin, the awards are the industry’s most prestigious recognition of excellence in the building and design sectors.
Acknowledging the best in all areas of construction and design, these awards go to the finest and most innovative projects, firms and practices over the last 12 months.
On the night, BAM won four of the accolades on offer; Public Building of the Year – Cork Courthouse, Student Accommodation of the Year – New Mill Dublin, Engineering Project of the Year – Visual Control Tower, Dublin Airport and Health and Safety Award of the Year.
Speaking in the success for the Cork Courthouse, Leahy commented:
“It’s an honour to receive Public Building of the Year. It’s quite an accolade of the recognition of the work that BAM has carried out.
“It’s now a criminal court, so Cork now has status to take on criminal cases.
“As for BAM, it’s another very successful PPP job carried out by the company.”
Given the company’s form to date, you can expect many more to come.
BAM Ireland
Head Office:
Kill,
Co. Kildare,
W91 KH3E,
Ireland.
Tel: +353 (0)45 886 400
Email: info@bamcontractors.ie
Cork Office:
Euro Business Park,
Little Island,
Co. Cork,
T45 R902.
Tel: +353 (0)21 451 7300
Email: info@bamcork.ie
Galway Office:
Unit 5 Liosban Business Park,
Tuam Road,
Galway,
H91 DR5W.
Tel: +353 (0)91 778 583
Email: info@bamgalway.ie
This article was published in Building Ireland Magazine, April 2020, Vol 6 No 2
