“The Hotel Hafen Flensburg construction project is a ‘typical’ inner-city building measure. Such projects involve various challenges regarding the set-up of the construction site and delivery of goods and material. Considering the needs of neighbours as well as possible effects on the traffic on location are only two more aspects, which need to be taken into account.
In the course of the construction work a total of eight buildings are combined to form one complex. The buildings are houses of different architectural styles from different centuries – from 17th century to new buildings. A major concern was to make the complex barrier-free despite different buildings with differing heights of the storeys. The new building required deep foundation. As the hotel is located directly at the harbour, the buildings were erected on former filling material, which was not able to bear the load. Moreover, the new building was built with an underground carpark – partially below water level.
A particular challenge is the reconstruction of the old buildings in the ensemble. In case of one of the buildings only the facade towards the street was preserved, and a sophisticated support structure was required in public space. Another building was completely gutted and the remaining walls had to be supported by 60 tons of steel structure. Then a new building was integrated in the existing facade. For the elevator and staircase core a special deep foundation was required which was built within the building. For the new ceilings also special structures were used in order to meet not only the fire protection requirements but also the needs of domestic engineering (structures, lines, piping). Due to the diversity of the eight original buildings the technical connections in terms of IT, ventilation, heating, and water supply took great effort resulting in many small-size solutions. And such solutions involved extensive considerations in terms of fire protection which is an essential aspect on account of the existing half-timer houses in the complex.”
