Orbital 25, Watford

This is one of eight blocks on the site with each block having up to 10 units. 7 of the blocks are complete and the last one is due for completion in the spring of 2008. George Voyias was Project Engineer responsible for the design of all the structural work as well as the roads and drainage.

The units have a steel framing with reinforced concrete ground bearing slabs and a composite concrete first floor slab cast on profiled metal decking. The first floor levels have either a complete floor for office use or a mezzanine floor for both office and storage space. The storage space at first floor has been designed to support an imposed loading of 5.0kN/square metre.

At the time of completion in 1992 this was the tallest high-bay rack-clad warehouse in the southern hemisphere extending to a height of over 30 metres. This type of structure is one in which the racking provides the lateral stability of the whole building.

The building is used by Toyota to store car parts in bays serviced by three semi-automated vertical travelling cranes.

Below the warehouse is a large reservoir that provided fire fighting water for the sprinkler system.