"There are no problems, only solutions."
That was the upbeat view of Josef Meier, Finnforest Merk's project manager at Charles de Gaulle airport, after the German-based timber engineering firm had com-pleted its part in the €130m redevelopment of Pier 2E at the airport.
The pier, an elliptical glass passenger hall serving Termi-nal 2E, is an imposing pres-ence seen from the airport tarmac; reaching 660m end to end, 30m across and 20m floor to ceiling. The terminal serves the SkyTeam group, including AirFrance, KLM and Alitalia, and was first opened in 2003, but Pier 2E was soon hit by disaster. The original internal concrete skin collapsed, killing four people, shortly before its first anniversary.
The pier had to be rebuilt and airport operator Aéroports de Paris (ADP) took the oppor-tunity to revisit the design and integrate more passenger-friendly elements like maxi-mum use of natural light and panoramic views across the airport.
It opted for a solution featuring a glass shell supported by a 2,800-tonne steel frame and clad internally in 18,000m2 of ash-veneered plywood panels set on a birch glulam frame. Designed in a spindle-shape, the giant ribcage structure, says ADP, creates a space of “lightness and transparency” with the wood giving a "warm indoor ambience".
“Wood gives an impression of comfort conveyed through its warm and varied colours based on yellows, reds and browns,” said ADP, adding that trav-ellers like it, too.
The project posed Finnforest Merk with a number of tech-nical and on-site challenges that required innovation both at the airport and its Aichach factory, with the 150 internal glulam beams and 1,787 ply-wood panels, not to mention 43,292 ash slat louvres, posing their own unique problem.
To start, the non-constant shape of the elliptical pier meant the company had to look at ways of installing curved timber to such a length. This led to the glulam beams being split into six, with a maximum length of 8.5m. Each then had to be attached to the steel framework, with the curving nature of the building once again testing Finnforest Merk. This put the precision engineering of the beams, which were manufactured at Finnforest Merk's Aichach factory, on the spot as well as the fixings developed for the project.
ADP's design idea called for a precision finish, meaning that every element of the building had to conform to tight toler-ances, as little as 10mm each way in many cases.
Consequently, Finnforest Merk developed the bespoke V3 suspension-based fixing system, which allowed the degree of release for each fixing point to be defined on site and the timber elements to follow the shape set by the steel structure.
Another demand of the project was the consistant appearance of the veneer throughout Pier 2E's zones, coupled with ensuring the intumescent coating, an essential part of the building's fire protection system, was kept as thin as possible. For this, Finnforest Merk produced a range of prototypes to “turn
problems into industrial solu-tions” at its factory.
A half-arch was built in Aichach to enable the company to evaluate the aesthetics and performance of the cladding, while an automated selection process allowed the veneers to be ordered by colour to create a uniform appearance across the 10 zones. Each covered panel was then prefabricated at the factory, before being numbered and marked to ensure quick and accurate installation on site.
Josef Meier said the thin in-tumescent coating added an element of fragility to the laminated boards, which meant that Finnforest Merk also had to be especially careful in the protection and handling of the material – with up to a third of the material held in storage at any time.
Around 130 truck journeys were needed to deliver the timber to site, a logistical ex-ercise in itself. With the airport continuing to operate around the build, accurate scheduling was vital to make sure that contractors had permission to be on site at the right time.
Finnforest Merk also under-took a programme of off-site training to ensure that its workforce had the right con-struction and vehicle operation skills – with cherry pickers, cranes and scissor lifts used throughout the job. Success on this front, it said, was intrinsic to the pier being completed on time and with a precision finish “to ensure that ADP's aesthetic vision was fulfilled”.
The finished building, say those involved, demonstrates the structural role that timber can play and the aesthetic and precise standards it can achieve in large-scale construction projects.
And ADP chief development officer Bernard Cathelain is fulsome in his praise of Finnforest Merk. “We could rely on them to deliver the total solution, from sourcing the raw materials through to the end installation,” he said. “Their company’s expertise has enabled ADP to achieve a design vision to the specified quality, within budget and on time.”
Next, Finnforest Merk will be hoping to garner similar plau-dits in Spain with what will be one of the world’s largest timber structures.
The Metropol Parasol in Seville will turn a former car park in the city into what is described as a “commerce and tourism zone”, shaped, appar-ently, like giant mushrooms sprouting from the ground. These structures too will use a composite of timber and metal, in this case steel rods and timber beams made in Finnforest’s Kerto-Q lami-nated veneer lumber.
Pier 2E: the facts
The new building cost €130m; the timber
element amounted to €11.4m.
• When fully operational, the pier will handle nine million passengers a year.
• It has a 45,000m2 footprint and is 660x30x20m.
• The glass shell has a surface area of 33,000m2.
• The building includes 2,800 tonnes of steel, 150 in-ternal glulam beams and 18,000m2 of ash veneered birch cladding.
• 18,000 tonnes of con-crete were taken off the site
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The elliptical shape of Pier 2E was one of the main issues that Finnforest Merk had to overcome |
