Problem Statement from the client

The client has leased multiple buildings for a long term (20+ years) and the lease period for a few of the buildings were about to end in a year or two. As the buildings had older workstation design, the client had plans to optimize the workstation design of a few buildings which would increase occupancy ratio. This would help end lease of other buildings and would save CapEx and OpEx in the upcoming years.

But the real challenge was to analyze which building had to be retained, retrofitting cost, limiting factors, etc.. Another big challenge in refurbishment projects was to adhere to regulatory requirements.

Decision making was only possible when all this analysis would come in a form of report which explains the possibilities, challenges, lead time and cost involved.

So, here we suggested our client with ‘Building Limitation Study’ service.

Scope of Work

The solution provided to the client was ‘Building Limitation Study’ which included:

• Checking the available building documents.
• Identification of limiting factors.
• Physical site inspection & asset conditional analysis.
• Evaluating the permissible occupancy ratio for the identified limiting factors.
• Regulatory requirements and Feasibility checks for the design options developed by Refurbishment Architect.
• High level budgetary report for redesign of the workstation layout for maximum permissible head count.

Based on the usage of the building the limiting factors were identified as Means of Escape, Discharge Value, Fresh Air, Restroom Provision, Cooling, Power, Vertical Transportation & Maximum head count per floor. Checks were conducted as per clients Global Engineering Standards, Global Workplace Standard & Regulatory requirements.

Project Location

03 Projects in Bangalore, India.

Input Shared by the client: 

• Existing building documents.
• Assessment template.
• Global Engineering Standards and Global Workplace Standards.

Software used:

• Autodesk Revit
• AutoCAD
• PDF viewer
• 360° photo viewer
• Spreadsheets viewer

Project Timeline

The timeline from the completion of site visit to submission of the building limitation study report was 1 week and the high level budgetary report was another 2 weeks.

Key Challenges & How we solved the problem

Challenge: As the buildings were very old from time to time a lot of local modifications were made in different parts of the building. The changes were not updated to the building drawings and reflected a lot of discrepancy in the layout.

‍Solution: As a first step laser scanning was conducted to capture the current conditions of the site and Asbuilt drawings were produced.

Challenge: The MEP drawings were only available in hard copies (ammonia print) and weak. Understanding the highside building system was a major challenge.

‍Solution: The ambiguous/ missing information from the old SLD’s and layouts were captured physically by visiting each equipment and understanding the system.

Outcome or How the client got benefitted

The detailed limitation study report helped the decision makers to understand the possibilities to redesign. It also gave them a high level budget which would help decide if the works can be conducted within the available budget. Long story short, the study provided all the required insights to the decision makers to make key decisions to lease the building or to optimize a few buildings.

Deliverables provided:

1. Report with building summary and high level assessment of the opportunities to close the gaps.
2. Appendices detailing the assessment including supporting calculations and code references.
3. Report on any discrepancies between the approved building plans and the built condition in so far as the differences affect the results of the Building Limiting Factors.