This summer a new factory opens in the North East of England – the first large-scale railway train building facility to be built in Britain for more than a century. Ray Philpott finds out what makes it special.
Aswathe of redundant farmland in North East England is being dramatically transformed into a high-tech industrial centre with a gigantic new factory at its heart.
This is where the country’s next generation of express trains will be made by a resurgent British railway manufacturing sector, following a huge investment by the Japanese bullet train manufacturer Hitachi.
Next year, the gigantic Hitachi works at Newton Aycliffe will begin building a fleet of 122 hi-tech, electric Class 800 Super Express trains – each 140mph-capable train taking 35 days to build from start to finish. From 2017 they will replace the iconic, but rapidly ageing and diesel-powered High-Speed Train (HST) fleet, operating on the Great Western and East Coast Main Lines. Later, they will also supercede 1980s-vintage Intercity 225 electric trains.
The creation of the £82 million facility is a cornerstone of the £5.7 billion Intercity Express Programme (IEP) run by the Department for Transport (DfT) in partnership with Agility Trains – a joint venture between Hitachi Rail Europe and John Laing Investments.
Prior to the existence of this new factory, Britain’s once world-renowned train and locomotive manufacturing industry had been in rapid decline. By 2005 there was just one major rolling stock manufacturing base operating in Britain, the Bombardier Transportation plant in Derby.
Now there are two again. But make no mistake, Hitachi Rail Europe’s cavernous new 43,000 sq m building is much more than just a factory. It symbolises the company’s ambitions to win a significant slice of sales in the buoyant multi-billion pound UK and continental European train manufacturing market. Indeed, Hitachi has recently made London the HQ of its global rail business.
The firm is also locating its UK design office at Newton Aycliffe, further symbolising its investment of cash and confidence in the expertise, flair and innovation of Britain’s rail industry. The factory will also provide a much-needed shot in the arm for the North East’s long-struggling manufacturing sector, creating 730 new jobs in the factory and employing many of the region’s firms in the construction process.
Initially the works will build, assemble and fit-out trains using metal body shells shipped over from Japan but the company has strongly indicated that the body shells could also be made at Newton Aycliffe in the future.
Greenfield site
The factory is situated five miles from Darlington on a 127,000 sq m greenfield site that takes up a third of the 104-acre Merchant Park being created by developer Merchant Place Developments. With a direct link to the UK rail network, the facility at the industrial park also includes a 1km-long test track for newly built rolling stock and sidings outside the building.
Designed and developed by British architects Ryder Architecture, working closely with Masayuki Ninomiya, chief architect for Hitachi Rail Europe, the factory not only has to fulfil practical and sophisticated industrial functions but needed to make a bold statement. Martin Elliott, Ryder’s architectural director, says:
“To deliver an advanced manufacturing base like this there has to be a close liaison during the design process with Hitachi and the developer. Our aim has been to create and deliver a functional, energy-efficient workplace that is intended to be one of Europe’s premium state-of-the-art train production facilities.”
Work began in November 2013, with topping out taking place in October last year and final completion and fitting out due this summer.
While building on a greenfield site might be considered to offer many advantages over a previously developed one, it also brings its own challenges. The site was known to originally be on or part of an Iron Age settlement and home to some rare amphibians.
Elliott explains:
“While planning consent was granted in 2012, before any construction work could begin an in-depth archaeological investigation and study of the site was carried out in 2013 over a period of nine months. Great crested newts, a protected species, were also found there, and had to be relocated to the nearby Newton Aycliffe nature reserve. We also needed to divert a public footpath.”
The survey did find evidence of ancient settlement in the area, but archaeology was limited in the land directly under the factory site and any findings were preserved where possible and recorded for posterity.
Even with the planning green light given, it was obvious that such a large scale manufacturing facility would require a significant amount of essential services and utilities to be provided. The trouble was that virtually no infrastructure of this sort was in place on this undeveloped site, and most of these services have had to run to the site for the first time.
The ground had to be prepared and levelled, a mammoth ask that saw 38,650 dumper loads of top soil shifted and 16,100 cubic metres of concrete laid down by a local company under the leadership of main contractor Shepherd Construction.
Striking
Essentially, the building is primarily constructed around a 2,000-tonne steel framework clad in fully insulated steel sheet.
The metal roof comprises four gable-profiled roof spans supported by widely-spaced steel columns with skylights covering 10 per cent of the surface and providing natural daylight to the whole factory floor. It is also clad with photovoltaic panels with a combined generating capability of one megawatt, making a significant contribution to the building’s energy supply. In addition, the building features dimmable LED lights with daylight sensors to minimise power consumption during daytime.
Anyone approaching the front elevation of the structure is faced with the striking facade under the first span, featuring two-tone low-E glass to the front and side and shaded by metal brise soleil to minimise solar heat gain. The offices and staff facilities are located behind this glass area which is internally separated by firewalls from the manufacturing areas.
Elliot explains:
“There’s a cutting edge spatial arrangement for both office and production areas allowing for future flexibility.”
“Workforce comforts and benefits are also carefully considered and there is strong provision for canteens, showers, locker space and excellent cycle storage space. Next to the offices and staff facilities is the hardcore industrial part of the building where trains are actually assembled and rolled out. Studies of various manufacturing scenarios were undertaken, including associated activities such as material deliveries, vehicle shunting and worker movements. These scenarios have helped define and drive the key elements of the building.”
The Newton Aycliffe facility has been designed to enable it to construct trains of varying size, design and complexity – not just the Intercity Express class of trains. In fact it will soon be operating simultaneous production lines for the Intercity Express and AT200 electric trains recently ordered for Glasgow to Edinburgh services. It also has the capacity to build-double- deck rolling stock for potential export to continental Europe.
Two crucial pieces of equipment that facilitate that are the bespoke electrically-powered traversers – or transfer tables. These huge pieces of moving equipment enable individual rail vehicles weighing up to 80 tonnes to be effortlessly shifted sideways from one track to the next during the manufacturing process. Developed and produced by specialist Sheffield company Mechan, they remove the need for a heavy lifting crane both inside the factory and outside. In the rail industry safety is always a business-critical factor and, consequently, Hitachi Rail Europe has a ‘no cables on the floor’ policy for its new factory.
Elliott adds:
“The facility needs well organised utility feeds to its 46 assembly workstations, and we utilised the overhanging pivot arms on the columns and other manufacturing structures to deliver this. The service integration and movable working platforms allow for future flexibility and provide a tidy, organised manufacturing environment which can ensure products of high quality.”
Additionally, TwinTec ‘jointless’ slab flooring made from steel fibre-reinforced concrete has been installed to create a trip hazard-free surface for the assembly and test line areas, traversers and offices.
Hitachi takes environmental issues seriously and is aiming to achieve a BREEAM Excellent rating and an extended building life of at least 60 years. This a quite a challenge, considering the vast footprint of the building – 180m wide, 274m long and 13m high – and the power-hungry nature of a heavy engineering environment.
Flagship
Hitachi Rail Europe’s Chief Architect Masayuki Ninomiya is responsible for ensuring the factory meets all of the company’s manufacturing requirements for current and potential future designs.
Ninomiya says:
“Building a brand new train factory on a greenfield site in Newton Aycliffe has been a very interesting challenge for us at Hitachi Rail Europe. However, our close work with Merchant Place Developments and Ryder Architects has been a very fruitful experience and the excellent progress on-site so far is testament to that.”
He adds:
“For Hitachi it’s important that we get this right because Newton Aycliffe is going to be our flagship train manufacturing facility in Europe.”
When the Super Express trains begin rolling off the production line in 2016 they will be the first true high-speed trains to be constructed in this country for over a decade. Yet, even in the relatively short time since construction of the factory began, Hitachi won a further major order to build a fleet of AT200 regional trains for Scotland.
So, even before it opens, the factory at Newton Aycliffe is already helping to get British train manufacturing firmly back on track.
If all goes well, new British-made trains may soon run in Europe!
By David Mote