Multiplex has completed a new 216-metre tall tower as part of a retail precinct at 80 Collins Street, delivering one of the largest new commercial office precincts in Melbourne’s CBD.
Owned by Dexus and Dexus Wholesale Property Fund following QIC’s divestment of the asset in May last year, the building was delivered to completion by QIC GRE.
The precinct includes a 38-level office tower that provides around 43,000 square metres of office space and a 255-room hotel along with refurbishments to an existing 47-level office building.
Architects Woods Bagot in collaboration with Dutch firm UN Studio performed the base building design and facades of both the new office tower and hotel.
The office tower features a faceted glass exterior cantilevering towards Collins Street. The interior features flexible floor plates with the ability to create inter-floor links.
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The retail precinct spans the ground and podium levels, with the three surrounding streets connected through a series of laneways.
Multiplex Regional Managing Director Graham Cottam said the company was proud to deliver the development to Collins Street.
“80 Collins Street was an extremely complex build with the new office tower constructed to cantilever 12 metres over existing buildings on Collins Street, the first time this engineering feat has been achieved on such a scale,” Cottam said.
“It is built to withstand 30,000 kilonewtons of tensile force through the concrete core, which is three times that of what has been previously built in Australia.”
Cottam said Multiplex developed an innovative construction method using steel ducts to facilitate the feeding of steel bars and reinforcements to form a new tension bar system. The system effectively withstands and transfers the tensile loads of the cantilevered structure to the building core, without the requirement for additional structural support columns.
Other construction methods include the use of a double-decker lift system in Australia. Two lift cars stacked on top of each other allow the lift to double its capacity without requiring extra space within the lift core.
Construction on the project began in April 2018, with around 800 workers on site every day in peak periods. Around 7000 tonnes of structural steel and 30,000 cubic metres of concrete were used throughout construction.