Environmental Products

Demolition contractor lets rip at the movies

Surrey based Downwell Demolition is tearing down the iconic studio hangars and buildings at Warner Bros Studios, Leavesden as part of a ?100 million full scale refurbishment and rebuild of the film and media complex.
Deploying a team of specialist UK Competence Plant Construction Scheme accredited staff, Downwell is using a combination of scissor access platforms and specialist demolition excavators to remove scaffolding, ceiling ducts, roof panels, sound proofing and skylights from seven set stage buildings, as well as demolishing ancillary buildings adjacent to the main studios. In their place, new structures will be built to accommodate the productions of future blockbuster movies. The strip-out and deconstruction will take place with some stage sets and archive libraries preserved within the structures.
Downwell is implementing a full recycling programme for all materials removed from the site to ensure the minimum environmental impact. It is also employing a Sandvik QJ340 track-mounted mobile jaw crusher, along with that machine?s predecessor, the C-12+, for the processing of diverse materials emanating from the project such as bricks, concrete blocks, rebar concrete and asphalt. The recycled aggregate will be on-sold to support other lower grade infrastructure projects.
Leavesden Studios was originally constructed on the site of the former Rolls Royce factory at Leavesden Aerodrome in the 1990s. The 1995 James Bond film GoldenEye was the first movie to be filmed there. It has subsequently hosted numerous other films over the years, including Star Wars: The Phantom Menace (1999), the entire Harry Potter series (2001-2011), Die Another Day (2002), The Dark Knight (2008), Sherlock Holmes (2010) and Inception (2010). Warner Bros purchased the site in November 2010 to become the only Hollywood film studio with a permanent base in the UK.
Sources: Sandvik Mining & Construction, Aggregate Research

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