Projects

Jet Centre, London Luton Airport

To assist business aviation operator Ocean Sky in consolidating their operations at London Luton Airport, we provided our design and project management services.

The designated building originally housed offices on the first and second floors with parking provided below in an undercroft. In order to provide a Fixed Based Operation (FBO) for their corporate clients, an extension to the undercroft was required for the FBO with the offices on the first and second floor refurbished.

Infrastructure works included: two new aircraft parking areas adjacent to the FBO building, the provision of a new portable water supply point, an airside vehicle wash down facility and the relocation of a substation.

The facility is now operated by Signature Flight Support.

Key details

Project name

Jet Centre

Client

Ocean Sky

Location

London Luton Airport

Services provided:

- Architecture

- Structural Engineering

- Civil Engineering

- Airfield Planning

- Building Services

- CDM Consultancy

- Project Management

Challenge

A key design issue was transforming the undercroft area into a functional business aviation facility. With the undercroft area originally designed as a car park, there were elements that did not ideally suit a building layout, including the services plant area located centrally within the building and deep reinforced concrete floor beams restricting ceiling heights and building services.

The design also required the incorporation of high-quality finishes internally to meet the client’s requirements. These were employed throughout the facility, including the reception area, arrivals and departure lounges, crew lounges, meeting room and operations room.

Solution

To successfully deliver this project, we provided a multi-disciplinary team; our architectural team provided the lead designer role for the building while the aviation infrastructure design team led the external works. We led collaboratively, managing the relationships between the building and external works teams and liaising with the client with numerous workshops to discuss and agree the building design and architectural finishes.

Buildability was also considered during the design as the existing services to the building needed to be operational throughout the construction stage. This was also applied to the external works as access was required to certain areas for airport operational equipment during early construction phases. Temporary works were therefore required to ensure there was no disruption to airport operations.