Ineco has been entrusted with the management of the refurbishment works for the new headquarters of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, European Union and Cooperation. Located in the centre of Madrid, it is an energy-efficient building with more than 50,000 m² of floor space, where more than 1,200 public employees will work. The building is highly flexible in its use of space and complies with EU energy efficiency directives and is BREEAM-certified for sustainability. All site information has been integrated into a Building Information Modelling (BIM), which has improved the quality of the project and optimised costs during construction and maintenance.

The Spanish Tourism Institute, Turespaña, which forms part of the Ministry of Industry, has approved the preliminary plan –drawn up by Ineco– to renovate the Madrid Convention and Exhibition Centre, after passing the public consultation stage.

The company has already drafted plans for the two basic projects into which the works will be divided, in accordance with the Public Sector Contracts Act: restoring the centre to adequate levels of safety and functionality, so that it can once again be operated as a concession; and completely renovating the so-called ‘Building B’ in order to house the new headquarters of the World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO).

An official delegation led by Reyes Maroto, the minister of Industry, was taken on a guided tour of the facilities in September by Ineco.

The Spanish Institute of Tourism (Turespaña) has commissioned Ineco to design the project for the remodelling and expansion of Madrid’s Palacio de Congresos, on the Paseo de la Castellana. The project will include an evaluation of the state of conservation of its most famous feature, the Joan Miró mural on its façade.

The Palacio de Congresos was opened in 1970 but has been closed since December 2012, when a technical report determined that it did not comply with safety regulations. Once remodelled, the 40,000 m² building will house the new headquarters of the World Tourism Organisation, which has been based in Madrid since 1975.

The passage of time had damaged the structure of the large canopy roof of the San Cristóbal railway station in A Coruña. For its refurbishment, Adif commissioned Ineco to draft the project. Before the works began, a study was carried out on the condition of its columns.

Based on the data obtained, a design solution and final report were produced to address the detected issues and provide alternatives for action. The work took 12 months and was completed in May 2018. The canopy roof is 100 m long, 33 m wide and 16 m high and covers the entire central hall of the station, an area of 3,300 square metres, which houses six tracks and four platforms (two lateral and two central).

It consists of a large-span metal structure, with 11 segmental arches (broader than the classic rounded arch), at a height of 16 metres on hot-riveted supports (typical of the industrial buildings of the late 19th and early 20th centuries). Beyond the large canopy roof, the platforms have additional protection that extends for a further 160 metres.

As a result of the renovation works, passengers can now enjoy new lighting after the removal of the last fibre-cement (uralite) features installed in the 1980s, which partially blocked the natural light. This, together with the repainting of the metal structure in light blue –replacing the previous red rust colour– have made the building brighter.

In addition to the aesthetic improvements, the project also involved a comprehensive renovation of the entire structure: the roof support straps and hooks were replaced with fireproof and anti-corrosion treated versions, and a new rainwater collection and discharge system, including drainpipes and gutters, was installed to ensure the watertightness of the roof. All rusted metal parts, such as profiles, bolts, joints, etc., were renovated, as was the paintwork.

76 years of history

The A Coruña railway station, which opened in 1943, is located in the city centre very close to the main thoroughfare, Avenida del Alcalde Alfonso Molina. It was designed in an austere neo-Romanesque style by the engineer and architect Antonio Gascué Echeverría, who chose granite, steel and glass as materials. It is an L-shaped terminal, with a façade of uncut granite ashlars with openings all of the way up and a corner tower that houses the clock. The passenger building is grade II listed, meaning that features such as the façade, sidewalls, interior yards, basic structural and typological elements and layout of spaces had to be preserved in their entirety.

Although construction was completed in 1935, it did not open until 14 April 1943 because of the Spanish Civil War and difficulties in building some sections of the railway.

In the 1980s, the central section of the original fibre-cement canopy roof was replaced with other material to provide greater light to the tracks. In the 2000s, the possibility of integrating all modes of transport –rail, buses, taxis and light rail, together with other amenities– on the same site began to be studied.

It has become very common to hear talk of BIM in technical forums, but what exactly is it? Do we know all its applications in our work? Who works with BIM in Spain, and who are they working for? BIM stands for Building Information Modelling, which brings us to the first clarification we should make: as well as buildings, BIM can also be used in infrastructure and any kind of construction in general.

Beyond these precisions, the concept of BIM is to use a graphical interface to document all the details that we want to gather about each building. Programs that work with BIM will show us the building elements of our work, and we will feed the program all the associated documentation. Once we finish this process, we will have a striking virtual model of the building and, more importantly, a large, perfectly-organised database for the design.

With BIM, our project is ostensibly superior and far more descriptive, coherent and complete

This is evidently a much more complete way of designing than using a CAD program; greater effort is required in the design phase for this reason. With all this information, the design is ostensibly superior and far more descriptive, coherent and complete. Using computers, we have resolved the problems that would usually arise on site, avoiding expenses for materials, distributing installations in the most suitable way, reducing completion times, minimising errors and making gains in safety and sustainability, among a great many other advantages. If we are ingenious in managing the data we feed into our model, the limit to these advantages is our imagination.

We can use BIM by searching for any of its known capabilities, but also for any other task we can imagine. All we need is to know and properly manage the parameters of the different building elements in our virtual model, or the parameters we have assigned them. To be more specific, let’s focus on the parameter of dimensions in BIM. One of BIM’s functions is the 3D modelling and visualisation. It is now possible to create precision designs thanks to powerful programs on the market. This allows us to offer to our customers any manner of technical drawings, which will be perfectly coherent with one another and fully parameterised.

We can also generate the most photorealistic images and impressive videos of our virtual models. However, when we incorporate 4D information, other uses become possible. The concept of time allows us to create work schedules, reducing completion times and integrating work from each discipline into each stage of the work. All this is done using the parameters of our virtual model. 5D information refers to the costs of different building elements and consignments, making it possible to generate estimates and project certifications as works develop. We can also link the different building elements to our favourite cost database and manage parametric measurements with our preferred estimating software. 6D information refers to the building’s sustainability. The software makes powerful energy use calculations, accounting for the building’s exposure to the sun and countless other criteria that directly influence the building’s sustainability throughout its life cycle. Finally, 7D information is dedicated to the operation and maintenance of the property, the costs of which reach several times the original cost of the work.

The BIM methodology can integrate the Lean methodology (cutting waste and inefficiency) and the concept of Integrated Project Delivery (IPD), a new trend in construction where the architect, engineers, contractor and even the administration work in conjunction in drawing up projects. This makes it possible to solve problems from the very beginning, when the cost of addressing them is negligible compared to rectifying errors of coordination once work is underway.

Whether we like it or not, BIM has arrived and it’s here to stay. The governments of many countries are promoting the use of BIM and making it a requirement of its biddings. There is no turning back. We do not have money to improvise prototypes for every work. With BIM, we create the prototype virtually and begin production once it is optimised, as if it were a ship or a plane.

The governments of an ever-increasing number of countries are promoting the use of BIM

BIM is not new by any means; what is new is the capacity of our personal computers to handle this enormous amount of information, and the ability to use telecommunications to send that information anywhere in the world. These new capabilities have made BIM a reality in the offices of small technical firms around the world, rather than only in large, elite centres. Spain is characterised by having a great number of these smaller offices and very few huge work centres. But let’s not forget the potential of Spain’s large engineering and construction firms. They are currently working more on large works in the rest of the world than in Spain. However, all the important work being done will gradually begin to require the use of the best available technology: BIM.

Pro-BIM organisations

All this movement led to the creation in late 2011 of the buildingSMART Spanish Chapter (www.buildingsmart.es) of BuildingSMART International, the agency that works with the ISO and the CEN in developing international standards for BIM. When it was founded, there were few more than 20 member companies, institutions and private individuals. Today, the group has over 140 members from all parts of the sector: engineering and construction firms, architects, building products manufacturers, software developers, project developers, research centres, universities, etc. Sergio Muñoz has been the organisation’s president since it was founded. If we examine the association’s website, we can see that its objectives are the following:

•  To develop and maintain international, open, neutral BIM standards (Open BIM).
•  To accelerate interoperability in the construction sector through success stories.
•  To provide specifications, documentation and reference guides.
•  To identify and solve problems interfering with the exchange of information.
•  To extend the use of this technology and its associated processes throughout the life cycle of the building, incorporating all actors involved.

Despite its short history and the fact that its members work without remuneration, it has made very significant achievements. The following are particularly noteworthy:

•  uBIM guides, produced with the voluntary participation of 80 technicians led by Manuel Bouzas. These guides are for users of BIM in Spanish and are analogous to the guides available in other countries and languages. The guides, comprising 13 documents, organise according to discipline the tasks of design, planning, construction and operation of buildings using BIM technology. The guides can be downloaded free at: www.buildingsmart.es/bim/gu%C3%ADas-ubim/.
•  The Spanish Journal of BIM is a dissemination and research journal, published in Spanish. Directed by Antonio Manuel Reyes, the journal has a science committee made up of a group of professionals in the sector from Spain, Portugal, Argentina and Chile. It has been published biannually since mid-2014, both digitally and in print. The journal is free and available for download at: www.buildingsmart.es/journal-sjbim/historial/.
•  esFAB, the Spanish BIM Academic Forum (www.buidingsmart.es/esfab/), is organised by Norena Martín and Óscar Liébana. The goal of the project is to create an academic network to develop and promote training, learning and research in the field of BIM through close collaboration and cooperation between members and other organisations and bodies whose ultimate aim includes improving the productive model of construction.

In addition to these achievements, members of this active organisation participate in one way or another in all conferences in the sector and all commissions that meet on the subject. Noteworthy examples are the AEN/CT 41/SC13 Committee, which when it concludes will draw up an UNE standard on standardisation in BIM projects, and the recently formed CEN/442 Committee, which fulfils the same role at the European level.

But if anything can be expected to give the definitive push towards the use of BIM in Spain, it would be esBIM (www.esbim.es), the BIM Commission set up by the Ministry of Public Works and organised by Ineco. The purpose of the commission comprises the following points:

1. To promote the implementation of BIM in the Spanish construction industry through the creation of a working group open to participation from the sector as a whole, both public and private.
2. To foster the use of BIM throughout infrastructure life cycles.
3. To raise awareness among public administrations about establishing BIM requirements in infrastructure public tenders with the aim of reducing costs.
4. To establish a schedule for adapting regulations for the generalised use of BIM.
5. To develop national standards allowing for a uniform application of BIM.
6. To produce the academic roadmap for BIM training in Spain and to promote its inclusion in curricula.
7. To promote the digitalisation of derivative work of infrastructure development, abandoning physical formats and consequently making economic and environmental savings.
8. To foster the application of Open BIM, wherein all BIM-related operations are based on open, universal, mutually interoperable standards.
9. To offer support in increasing and improving the position of Spanish industry in the world through the use of BIM methodology.
10. To secure Spain’s participation in all international decision-making forums.

As a final comment: one idea that came out of this commission, and hence also out of the Ministry of Public Works, is for designs for public buildings submitted from 2018 to support BIM, and for linear works designs to support it from early 2019. The BIM train has pulled into the station, are you getting on board?

Vigo-Peinador airport has undergone a number of works in recent years, for example the construction of a new public car park with over 2,500 spaces and the enlargement of the southern terminal building. The Instituto Feiral de Vigo (IFEVI), which is very near to the airport, hosts more than half the international events held in Galicia. A large proportion of attendees arrive by air. The large capacity of the new terminal car park also makes it possible to expand the parking offered by the exhibition centre itself. Given the short distance separating the airport and the exhibition centre, visitors used to travel between the two across the roundabout by which both places are accessed by road. The considerable traffic, the dimensions of the roundabout and the high number of roads connected to it made the walk a long, tortuous journey, where road crossings were challenging and pedestrians were not protected from poor weather conditions.

The pedestrian walkway connecting Vigo-Peinador airport with the Instituto Feiral de Vigo has two purposes. Firstly, there is the intention of exploiting the airport terminal car park to serve the exhibition centre. Secondly, the walkway facilitates the connection between the terminal and the exhibition centre for visitors arriving by air. It establishes a path that connects both places, and on another level avoids the different roads between the terminal car park and the IFEVI centre.

The walkway begins at car park P-1 and ends beside the heavy vehicle parking basins at the exhibition centre. The walkway has a total length of 281 m, with 10 spans of a maximum length of 40 m.

The walkway’s roof is designed with geometrical surfaces whose orientation follows a logical sequence spanning the length of the walkway. The play between different dimensions, densities and angles of the different segments brings the ensemble a dynamic, three-dimensional character.

The third meeting of the BIM (Building Information Modelling) Commission, which was held in February, was presided over by Mario Garcés, subsecretary of Public Works, and was participated in by Jesús Silva, president of Ineco, who presented the programme for 2016. Ineco supports the Ministry of Public Works in this Commission, which seeks to drive forward the implementation of the BIM methodology in Spain in which representatives of the public and private sector participate.

This initiative wants to promote the use of this methodology throughout infrastructure life cycles, to rise awareness among public administrations about the establishment of BIM requirements in infrastructure tenders, to establish a regulation schedule, to develop national standards and to boost training in Spain. In the session the beginning of activities of the EU BIM Task Group in Brussels were also analysed. This group, co-financed by the European Commission, includes representatives from public administrations of 14 Member States.

On the picture, from left to right, Jorge Torrico, Ineco Project subdirector, Jesús Silva, president of Ineco, and Mario Garcés, subsecretary of Public Works.

“To create a unique symbol for each place”

Bruce Fairbanks, founder of Fairbanks Arquitectos, has accumulated extensive experience in the design of airport buildings since 1996 when he won the tender for the construction of the Madrid-Barajas control tower.

Presently in the world of airports there is a trend to promote the control tower as a symbol, an image that represents the airport and a reference point for the arrival in, and departure from the city where it is located. This trend has created increased interest in architectural execution in the design of control towers in addition to their functional requirements. It is precisely the individuality of these requirements that significantly affects the type of building, such that throughout history there are various examples of “types” of tower designs, which, once designed, were repeated in various airports: one notable case is the leoh Ming Pei control tower. It was designed between 1962 and 1965 with the objective implementation in 70 airports, although in the end 16 were built. The concept of locating in upper levels strictly that which was necessary was developed, putting the maximum amount of functions in the base building, which was adapted to the specific characteristics of each location. As such, the tower could be prefabricated and repeated with standardised equipment, giving the airport network an image of safety since a controller could work in any location without having to adapt. The tower was designed with 5 standardised heights (18-46 m) in accordance with visibility requirements in each location. The control tower’s cab is pentagonal so there are no parallel façades and so as to avoid reflections. In Spain, in the 1970s, Juan Montero Romero, an aeronautical engineer, built a tower, which was repeated in several cities: Málaga, Alicante, Valencia, etc.

To create a landmark, the architect must find within the functionality the characteristics that distinguish one tower from others

Converting control towers into airport landmarks and reference points for cities is a challenge in the work of an architect: creating a symbol, always unique for each location, which meets all of the requirements for the optimal functioning of the tower. The location, the height of the control room, its form and the layout of its structural elements are some of the first elements to define. Control towers typically have a base building and a shaft that supports the upper floors, which are designed to adapt to the control operations. Given the form, with an upper part and a lower part and the height of the type of building, in my opinion it is essential to incorporate the construction process into the design of the tower, and this is what I have done in those which I have designed. This design comes from an analysis of the functional aspects, the programme and the location. To create a landmark, the architect must find within the functionality the characteristics that can distinguish one tower from others and strengthen them to create a unique tower with its own character in each case.

Analysis of four cases

The following examples of control towers show diferente conceptual approaches to design this building type and the elements that diversify its design.

1962. Dulles airport, Washington DC
Eero Saarinen

The Dulles tower has all of the equipment rooms at a height, elegantly assembled by Saarinen with two juxtaposed bodies. The form of the tower is integrated with that of the terminal building, also designed by the same architect.

1992. JFK airport, Nueva York
Pei Cobb Freed & Partners

The upper part of the JFK tower, 97.5 metres in height, contains only the aerodrome control cab and half way up the shaft there is the platform control room, which takes the same form as the upper levels.

1997. Adolfo Suárez Madrid-Barajas airport
Bruce Fairbanks

The Adolfo Suárez Madrid-Barajas control tower had the specific feature of a 400 m² equipment room located at a height. To resolve the transition between the shaft of the tower and the projection, an inverted half sphere was adopted, with a floor for air conditioning equipment being inserted in the support. The octagonal shape defined for the
cab is extended throughout the top of the building, the structural design of a central column and 8 perimeter columns is repeated on all levels.

Another particular feature of the tower is the construction system designed as an integral part of the design. The shaft is built with prefabricated segments assembled in spirals, which, on the inside, contain the service ducts and circumscribe the emergency stairway. The upper floors were built with a metallic structure on the floor and subsequently hoisted onto the shaft. The system allowed the tower to be built in nine months, without using scaffolding.

2004. Barcelona-El Prat airport
Bruce Fairbanks

The functional requirements were similar to those of Barajas, with the exception that a large part of the equipment is located in the base building. The resistant structure is defined independently from the functional elements of the shaft, which was developed as a representative design element. An eight-pointed hyperbola generated from the octagonal shape of the cab holds the upper floors.

The hyperbola links the tower with Catalan Modernism and Antoni Gaudí, who used this form in many of his designs, including on the domes of the Sagrada Familia. The construction system is a representative part of his design. The assembly of the hyperbola, built with prefabricated concrete girders, was guided by a central aluminium structure designed to contain the elements of the shaft. The upper floors were built on land and hoisted into position, supported by the eight points of the hyperbola, consolidating the whole structure when it was under load.

“In the future, it will not be necessary to view operations”

Roberto Serrano has participated in more than 50 aeronautical projects, amongst them, the NET and SAT control towers of Madrid-Barajas airport and the new control tower of Eldorado airport (Bogotá).

Although the first control towers date back to the 1920s (in 1921, Croydon airport in London was the first in the world to introduce air traffic control), it was from the 1930s that they became commonplace, due to the fact that growing aircraft traffic made controlling and managing it necessary. At that time, in which technology was nothing like the current systems, the need to visually supervise aeronautical operations around the airport was met by placing the control room (cab) in an elevated and predominant position of the airport (control tower).

To date, the first steps in designing a control tower involve establishing its site and the height of the cab. Internationally, to meet the viewing requirements from the cab, the recommendations of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) are applied. The optimum height and location of a control tower is the result of weighing up many considerations. The view from the cab requires the air traffic controller to be able to distinguish the aircraft and vehicles that circulate in the manoeuvring area, as well as aircraft that fly over the airport, particularly in take-off and landing paths. The objective is to have the maximum visibility possible and avoid the sun, external light sources and reflections from adjacent buildings affecting the visibility of the controller.

Nowadays, technology allows a practically blind landing

With regard to the location, we must consider the potential effects of local weather: flood areas or areas susceptible to fog. Its compatibility with the potential future development of the airport must also be studied, thereby avoiding the need to relocate the tower before the end of its life cycle. Insofar as possible, the tower and its buildings should be located on the landside of the airport, thus avoiding access through the airfield and facilitating the entry of staff. Furthermore, the location should be such that it does not affect the quality of the signals of the airport’s radio navigation aids (ILS, VOR, DME, etc.), or communication systems. The minimum height required for the control tower can be obtained with the aid of the FAA visibility analysis tool, ATCTVAT (Airport Traffic Control Tower Visibility Analysis Tool), in accordance with the physical conditions of the airport.

Once the position and height has been determined, the infrastructure is designed, and generally includes a cab and an antenna field, which, located on the roof of the cab, normally has communications antennas, radio relays, and other electronic and lightening protection elements. Furthermore, there are areas for staff, equipment, power, air conditioning, etc.

In an era in which technology provides information to pilots to allow a practically blind landing, is it necessary to keep air traffic controllers in a high position so they can see these operations? In the future, air traffic control rooms will probably be in buildings that are more similar to those of offices or air traffic control centres than the current towers.

The future has already become reality

2015. Control tower of Örnsköldsvik airport, Sweden

Recently, Örnsköldsvik airport in Sweden replaced its control tower with high-tech cameras. Signals are sent to controllers stationed in Sunvsal airport, located around 150 kilometres away, from a 25-metre mast with 14 high-definition cameras. The high performance of these cameras eliminates blind spots, provides information in rain, fog or snow and, along with a whole series of weather sensors, microphones and other devices, it allows controllers to feel as if they were beside the runway. The Swedish Transport Agency approved remotely operated towers on 31 October 2014. Six months later, the first airplane landed in Örnsköldsvik airport using the remote tower services.