Overcoming project management hurdles

The Home of Jump racing in the UK is undergoing a dramatic redevelopment.

Cheltenham is world renowned for its four day Festival each March, attracting more than 236,000 people and adding around 50m to the local economy

EC Harris LLP has been charged with the task of project management of the 45m development representing The Jockey Clubs largest ever single investment in capital estate facilities.

But the challenge for those working on this project doesnt run easy; the racecourse, concert, conference and exhibition facilities will remain open throughout the development until completion in time for The Cheltenham Festival in March 2016.

Keith Andrews, a partner at EC Harris and Martin Rowland an associate at the same firm are excited by the prospect of delivering such a project.

We are delighted to be working on such a project, fundamentally improving one of the countrys most well-loved racecourses, working with Cheltenham to showcase the very best of national hunt racing facilities on the world stage, says Keith. It is about a significant enhancement of the facilities and customer experience on offer at all levels of price point, with the grandstand itself, the walkways etc. hugely helping movement around the course and the multi-tiered viewing around the parade ring placing the horse even more at the centre of the experience, all the while being careful to maintain the unique character that people love about the Home of Jumps racing.

We have been acting as project managers for The Jockey Club for the past 10-12 years, covering their major project work, involving major new grandstands at Aintree, Epsom as well as the redevelopment of The July Course at Newmarket for example.

The  work at Cheltenham includes a new 6,500 capacity grandstand, alongside the existing main grandstand, replacing the circa 1920s A&R block, as well as bars and venues, a re-routed horse walk and a refurbished weighing room.

Martin explains: There are lots of elements to factor in when taking on a project like this.

The main works on site started straight after The Festival had finished this year in March. Racing runs from October to May, but during the racing close season last year we took the opportunity to de-risk the project, undertaking asbestos surveys, removing the asbestos found and diverting essential services.

It wasnt part of the original scope, Martin says but we also had some fairly major electrical services and water drainage systems which ran under the site to divert. So, a lot of this early work took place as enabling works, so that when the grandstand was knocked down, we didnt find ourselves with a problem.

As a result EC Harris let advanced enabling works and demolition contracts, including demolition of the Royal Box and part of the old grandstand to get a clean start with the main contract.

One of the biggest issues for the team was always going to be timeframes.

Keith explains: We realized that we couldnt do the development between one Festival and the next, it wasnt possible for all of this work to happen in eleven months.

The Jockey Club did not want to move The Festival away from Cheltenham,  that was not on the agenda, so we had to find a way that we could complete the project over a maximum 23 month period and work out how we can run The Festival in the middle of the development and maintain the other essential racecourse events.

Because Cheltenham wanted to remain open throughout the development, Keith and his team had to juggle when and where work would happen.

As well as the racing, Cheltenham holds a number of other events throughout the year such as conferences, exhibitions and concerts, explains Keith. Its a year round venue. There are large events held across the racecourse estate which need to be accommodated within the redevelopment logistics.

We have to get contractors, labour, materials and plant in to feed the construction process, all while this is a live site and that is the real challenge.

So did having a schedule for being up and running by the 2016 Festival make things harder?

Its harder in as much that you have a fixed end date which you simply cant miss, adds Martin. The way to address that is to ensure that you have sufficient contingency in the programme to cope with what could feasibly occur, to be used if necessary.

For us we looked at the front end when we were first involved back in Summer 2012, there wasnt any design or strategic programme in place.

So the Design Team undertook some early design work, working very closely with the Racecourse, to get in for planning early and give us maximum time thereafter to refine the employers requirements before engaging a main contractor. In the end the design was brought forward by four months.

Stakeholder management
Along with the early design, full stakeholder consultation was undertaken.

Martin says: There has been an awful lot of consultation. Not just with the planners but with local people, special interest groups and many parties involved in staging Racing in the UK, that need to own their part of the overall design. This all went very well which helped smooth the path for development.

One of the biggest issues was that there were lots of stakeholders, from the clerk of the course, who knows what he needs in order to get racedays on, to  marketing and events people, the business community, facilities managers, catering; all of these people have needs to ensure their day-to-day operations run smoothly.

We held a series of talks with stakeholders discussing the plans together with what restrictions we would need to place on the contractor, explains Martin. We asked what they needed and took this into account. It all happened before we went out to tender, so that  the contractor knew exactly what the restrictions would be at the time of tendering described in detailed sequence diagrams and programmes.  

The nature of a racecourse means it throws up different challenges, through existing infrastructure and age.

Keith explains: An aspect that made this project more difficult is that racecourses are quite unique. They have developed slowly over time so quite often not everyone is sure what is and isnt there. For examples existing services cables are not accurately recorded underground or are hidden slung from underneath the steppings.

For a race meeting to be allowed to happen, a number of race critical elements have to be adhered to. These include things like safe access for people and horses and medical facilities, health and safety.

There are about 15 services requirements around the racecourse, so we did a survey of all of those existing services using a specialist, experienced consultant  familiar with racecourses and used on previous projects - we prepare as much as we can in advance.

Its simple, if you dont get the people and horse movement right then you dont get racing there are a number of race critical elements that need to be fulfilled. Some of which, like the new weighing room, have to be done close season and ready for use.

So what does Keith think are the keys to success working on projects such as this?

You have to minimize the unknowns, Keith says, Risk management from the very beginning was key. We highlighted the potential risks, prioritized them and identified owners and mitigation measures.

We also ensured that the contract procurement strategy, stakeholder management, and programme management were also in place. It is vital that your contract documents are as robust, well briefed and researched as possible to ensure that you avoid any unknowns and manage change.

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This article first appeared in Project magazine. APM members can read all feature articles from Project magazine over recent years by accessing the Project magazine archive.

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