Gulf Construction Online - Mega projects benefit from K&A’s expertise

Saudi Arabia

Khamis Mushayt II ... a satellite city spanning 10 million sq m.

Mega projects benefit from K&A’s expertise

01 May 2019

Khatib & Alami (K&A), an award-winning international multidisciplinary consultancy, is delivering several key projects in various sectors throughout Saudi Arabia and thus making a lasting contribution to the kingdom’s future development.

Having successfully completed landmark assignments on projects such as the Haramain High-Speed Rail, Riyadh Metro, and Jabal Omar Development, among others, K&A is working to support the Ministry of Finance (MoF) on a number of mega-projects in Makkah and Madinah, mostly involving development and construction of infrastructure and buildings.

Jabal Omar Development ... K&A supervised construction of Phase One.

K&A’s role, as the project management consultancy (PMC) contractor, is to establish and run the programme management office (PMO) whose main objectives are to ensure proper project definition, instil a dynamic project management practice, energise project teams and generally take steps to ensure project success, a spokesman for the consultancy tells Gulf Construction.

Also in Makkah, K&A has completed the construction supervision and infrastructure works of Jabal Omar Development, Phase One, including 10 buildings with a built-up area of 500,000 sq m.

“Considered as one of the largest construction projects in Makkah, this large mixed-use development within walking distance of the Grand Mosque will extend the city’s capacity to host a growing number of pilgrims,” he explains.

Transport

K&A has successfully completed its role on the design-build project, Haramain High-Speed Rail, Phase One, after a period spanning nine years, where it was the lead consultant of preliminary and detailed design of civil work.

“Haramain High-Speed Rail is one of the most important transportation projects in the Saudi rail network expansion programme and one of the largest in the Middle East, targeting nearly 60 million passengers annually, including Hajj and Umrah pilgrims,” the spokesman says, underscoring the project’s importance.

K&A also last year handed over the study and design of Riyadh Metro, Package One – wet and dry utility diversions work for lines One and Two. The metro network will be the backbone of the city’s public transport system and will create about 15,000 jobs in Saudi Arabia, meeting the demands of its growing population while reducing traffic congestion and improving air quality, he says.

Road bridges crossing Haramain High Speed Rail line.

Infrastructure & Housing

K&A’s Al Wajeed Water Masterplan is a major social infrastructure initiative aligned with the kingdom’s Vision 2030. This life-critical project, located in the Empty Quarter desert, is safeguarding the well-being of more than half a million people in the Tathleeth and Bisha governorates, where water shortages were presenting a serious threat to the health of the inhabitants and the economy.

This outstanding project enjoyed an unprecedented success this year at the Meed Projects Awards, where it was named Saudi Arabia’s national winner in the ‘Water Project of the Year’, the ‘Innovation Medal’, and the ‘Engineering Achievement of the Year’ categories.

The practice also holds credit for the design of a sludge solar drying system at Madinah Sewage Treatment Plant, which is a pioneering concept of capturing solar energy inside specially designed greenhouses to turn sludge all year long into an asset that can be used in the agricultural and industrial fields.

In Hail, K&A is helping Wadi Al Udayra become an environmentally protected area, restore its natural ecosystem and support its integration with the region’s urban fabric and reignite its economy.

Apart from the Ministry of Finance, K&A has maintained a long-lasting relationship with the Ministry of Housing for which it has completed the masterplans, infrastructure design and supervision of numerous housing and investment sites in Asir and Baha governorates, Madinah and Jeddah. These include sites that each span 10 million sq m, such as the Khamis Mushayt II satellite city in Asir and the Bohrat Khakh in Madinah.

K&A has also supported the Ministry of Health in the construction, supervision, and project management of 10 hospitals and medical towers in Makkah, Jeddah, Al Khobar and Riyadh as part of Saudi Arabia’s plan to expand healthcare capacity.

National Guard site at Abyar Ali ... spanning 3.8 milllion sq m in Madinah ... a key project.

Growth & investment

K&A has more than 50 years of experience in Saudi Arabia, and is considered among the Top 50 international design firms and the Top 10 in the Middle East, according to Engineering News-Record (ENR).

With its holding company based in Singapore and executive office in Dubai, the company operates in more than 30 locations worldwide and employs around 6,000 people, primarily across the Middle East and Africa. In Saudi Arabia alone, it employs more than 2,800 people and is proud to help the kingdom realise its vision by developing its cities and achieving environmental sustainability.

“Throughout its mega-projects in Saudi Arabia, K&A has been committed in its support for Saudisation, with the development of local skills and knowledge transfer, and building a skilled workforce and a local supplier base,” says the spokesman.

He says, through its work on the Ministry of Finance’s PMO, K&A is helping to drive up standards of project management through building capabilities and ensuring that knowledge and skills acquired through the PMO are retained within the kingdom.

K&A aims to offer both practical and technical experience in energy performance, renewable and clean energy, low carbon technology, water conservation, materials sciences and regulatory compliance.

Last year saw K&A move towards its vision of being ‘the partner of choice for its industry’, thanks to continued investment in its people, capabilities, systems and technologies. An example of this is its implementation of a digital transformation strategy to maximise utilisation of technology in a multidisciplinary way that will bring new business line offerings with digital functionalities and data-based services.

Wet utilities diversion works for Riyadh Metro, Package One ... study and design completed last year.

“These actions are enabling us to deliver a full breadth of world-class services. We are also responding to new demands, opportunities and trends in the market, including different project delivery methods such as early contractor involvement and design and build, with increasing numbers of clients looking to embrace new risk reward profiles.

“This means leveraging our engineering expertise with financial modelling to help clients ensure their projects are bankable and attractive to investors, while participating actively in PPP (public-private partnership) projects from the supply side,” the spokesman says.

In line with its commitment to be at the forefront of technology and digitisation, K&A is a global leader in geospatial systems integration and a platinum partner of Esri, an international supplier of geographic information systems (GIS). The company is using this expertise to support public and private sector clients across the kingdom. Recently, this included helping the Saline Water Conversion Corporation (SWCC) centralise and optimise real-time information of desalinated water production, transmission efficiency, storage levels, water quality, cost and other key monitoring parameters.

In addition, for Riyadh Municipality, K&A designed a tool using advanced GIS techniques to support the Riyadh Development Authority (RDA) in the provision and allocation of public services, based on urban growth and future needs for an area of over 5,700 sq km.