Protection and prevention
Published: 23 September, 2010
Keeping shopping centre car parks in good condition is a great way to improve customer experience and increase loyalty in a lean time when keeping customers coming back is vital to revenue streams. Refurbishments also help to save on future maintenance costs and ensure the car park is safe. So, what products and services are available to prevent the deterioration of car parks? And what are the best practices for keeping car parks in top condition?
The importance of maintaining car parks was reinforced 13 years ago when a 120 tonne section of Pipers Row car park in Wolverhamption collapsed during the night in March 1997. With many multi-storey car parks approaching their half century anniversaries, the majority of older car parks need extensive repairs and even newer car parks often need a facelift.
Matrix Solutions is currently working on the two multi-storey car parks at Brent Cross shopping centre undertaking concrete repairs, crack injection, defining pedestrian walkways and treating 50,000 sq m of decking. The company has recently finished work on Churchill Square shopping centre in Brighton and a £6.3m contract at the Peacocks shopping centre in Woking which won a BPA award for best refurbishment.
Director Tim Whittaker says: “There are a number of reasons why it’s so important to look after your car park. First of all you need to protect the value of your asset and secondly owners have a responsibility to make sure the car park is safe.” He explains that a lot of older car parks were poorly constructed and it isn’t uncommon for pot holes to appear or even for lumps to drop off.
Safety concerns have meant that several car parks have shut in the past 12 to 18 months and are under investigation including Birmingham Road car park in Litchfield. Crown Street car park in Ipswich has been demolished and Queen’s Medical Centre car park in Nottingham has also been earmarked for demolition.
A whole host of things can damage car parks causing cracking and corrosion, reducing carrying capacity and the lifespan of the structure. Often the more serious damage can’t be seen with the naked eye.
As Makers’ technical director Peter Cowlard says: “The single biggest issue of deterioration is chloride being dragged in from the streets. We still use de-icing salt in this country and you get chloride ions penetrating the concrete. The other thing is carbonation caused by CO2 in the environment.”
Car park refurbishment specialist USL StructureCare offers a wide range of products and services including full refurbishments, protective coatings, lighting, waterproofing, concrete repair and movement joints. The company also manufactures and applies its own anti-carbonation coatings and has worked on numerous shopping centres including Liverpool One, Burns Mall in Kilmarnock and Overgate in Dundee.
life care plans
StructureCare can also implement life care plans which were introduced in 2002 after the Pipers Row collapse prompted the Institute of Civil Engineers (ICE) to release the document Recommendations for the Inspection, Maintenance, and Management of Car Park Structures.
USL StructureCare director John Taylor explains: “We do a full survey and testing service so we can recommend a little bit of maintenance work or a full refurbishment and plan what needs to be done over the years to keep the car park well-maintained. This can be done for new car parks very quickly whereas an old car park that is falling to bits might take two months of tests and planning.”
“The problem is life care plans are discretionary and not mandatory and car park owners have been slow to adopt it. People just don’t have the budget to pay for on-going projects.”
The BPA has been encouraging more of its members to implement life care plans and its efforts may be paying off. Whittaker believes life care plans are becoming more and more popular and has about a dozen clients taking them up every year, whereas before people were either doing nothing at all or having a full refurbishment.
Makers is an approved contractor and has undertaken work on over 200 car parks. Its clients include Jones Lang LaSalle, Costain, DTZ and King Sturge. Makers services include concrete repair, electrochemical treatment, structural strengthening, expansion joints, liquid applied deck waterproofing and protective coatings.
The company offers a full service from concrete testing, putting specifications in place to determine what work needs to be done to improve longevity and doing the work itself – providing all stages towards ensuring the car park is in a good state.
The time it takes to do a refurbishment varies dramatically depending on the size of the car park and the scope of the project. An average Makers refurbishment including concrete repairs, electrochemical services and coatings takes about 14 weeks although this depends on the amount of space the landlord has allowed work to be done on while the rest of the car park is in use. A Matrix refurb on a 600-space car park could take anywhere between 16 and 32 weeks at a cost of £250,000 to £2.3m.
For many landlords it isn’t always feasible to get the work done in one go, particularly in the aftermath of the recession when there is little spare cash and the centre interior is often the focus of the maintenance budget. Cowlard advises those on a shoestring budget to get the work done slowly. “You need to put a plan in place so you know how to arrest deterioration,” he says. “First of all you need to understand it – £5,000 or £6,000 will provide you with reasonable testing data.
“It might be that more salt comes in the lower area so you plan to get that under control. In the next couple of years you might work on the next few levels. You need to find out where the damage is occurring and the best way to spend your money. We always tell our clients they don’t have to do it in year one. That way they can put the budget in place and they can they can get the work done slowly.”
Whittaker, adds: “We relish and are happy for people to take on an all singing, all dancing refurbishment but we provide tailor-made packages for people who may not be able to afford a full refurb.”
“A lot of people get blanket coatings and cover the whole car park but often that’s not required. Get a conditions survey carried out and target a repair strategy around that – it might be that 10 per cent of the car park is deteriorating, so you can treat that at a fraction of the cost and hold the car park in its current condition for another two or three years by which time there might be more money available to do further works.”
“Treating the urgent areas and monitoring corrosion to identify hot spots will give the client peace of mind.”
Makers has been applying Triflex deck coatings over asphalt for almost a decade. According to Cowlard a number of developments are now putting coatings on from day one.
“Liquid coatings help to lengthen life,” says Cowlard. “Cold applied coatings are better from a health & safety point of view, especially as most of the work is done while the car park is still live. It’s also lighter on the structure so there’s weight-saving – if you can take weight off it’s a major benefit.
“We have a 10-year guarantee on all our deck coatings. A lot of asphalt struggles to last five years and it’s important to repair it before too much water gets in.”
Whittaker reinforces the importance of coatings. “A lot of multi-storey car parks were built in the 70s when concrete controls weren’t as tight as they are now,” he says. “This means there is a lot of corrosion, honey-combing and blow holes which make the surface textured and allow for deterioration. Coatings and special treatments are the best way to protect against this.”
“They protect the structure and prolong the life of the asset. They also help with the aesthetics and can significantly improve the look of the car park, making it brighter, lighter and more user-friendly. In a lean time this can prove vital in stopping people from using competitor car parks.”
expansion joints
Cowlard concludes that expansion joints are often overlooked, warning: “People are specified the wrong type and then just leave them. Getting them right can provide 100 per cent waterproofing of the deck but if you get them wrong they will fail and leak.”
StructureCare offers an independently certified presentation – “Structural Deterioration in Concrete Car Parks – Prevention, Cure and Life Care Plans” geared towards client organisations with all levels of knowledge as well as architects and engineers.
The presentation covers causes of deterioration and corrosion including carbonation, chloride attack and water ingress and gives examples of remedies and measures to prevent corrosion including waterproofing, concrete repair, electrochemical techniques, and anti-carbonation coatings along with details of life care plans and the ICE Guidelines 2002.
