Gulf Construction Online - Luxury by the bay

Qatar Review

Targeted for completion by June ... The West Bay Complex.

Luxury by the bay

01 March 2004

Over the past 33 months a barren stretch of land next to the Doha Sheraton in Doha’s prestigious West Bay area has been transformed into a massive mixed-use development including a five-star hotel, a state-of-the-art residential apartment complex, an office tower and 20 town houses.

With scheduled completion targeted at June this year, local contractor Construction Development Company (CDC) is putting the finishing touches to the interiors of the prestigious West Bay complex, while simultaneously carrying out the landscaping works.

Hotel
The complex includes an 18-storey hotel which resembles twin towers each surmounted by a coronet. Managed by the Four Seasons chain, the hotel has lower and plaza levels and comprises 240 rooms, including one royal suite, four presidential suites and a number of executive suites. It has a 600 to 700-seat ballroom which will also function as a meeting room, and there will be a number of additional multi-purpose rooms available for conferences and seminars.
In addition to the all-day restaurant, the hotel will also feature an Italian restaurant, cigar lounge and tea lounge.
What was originally to be a clubhouse has now been redesigned as a state-of-the-art spa and will have a number of exclusive features, which will boost the appeal of the hotel, says Nabil Elias, project manager for CDC.
The hotel will have three swimming pools.

Office tower
The office tower has a gross floor area of 39,900 sq m. It is served by eight high and low-rise elevators, with capacities of 1,130 kg each. The tower also has one service elevator with a capacity of 2,040 kg. There are 262 car-parking spaces allocated for the office tower.

Apartment towers
Each of the two apartment towers has a gross floor area of 19,052 sq m on 22 levels including the lower and plaza levels. Each building features a lobby, a club lounge, a security office and lease storage area in the lower level.
One of the towers is designated primarily for single businessmen (Tower A) while the other is for families (Tower B). Each apartment has a balcony, a fully-fitted kitchen and a washer/dryer.
Tower A offers a total of 100 one and two apartments and one penthouse. Tower B incorporates a total of 55 one, two, three and four-bedroom apartments and one penthouse. The towers have a total of 231 car-parking slots.
The apartment boasts a number of luxury features and recently the beach area has been extended to serve the residents of the apartments and additional swimming pools are also being built. In addition, the finishes of the towers have also been upgraded.

Town houses
The 20 town houses – in five blocks of four – have been built right on the beach by the 110-berth marina and will be available for rent. The three-storey townhouses each cover an area of approximately 250 sq m and have an enclosed parking garage and an outdoor pool.
All the facilities will be linked with landscaped pedestrian walkways and amply supported with surface and underground car-parking facilities. The total built-up area will be 55,411 sq m.
CDC started work on the $140 million contract in July 2001 and expects to complete it on schedule by June-end.
The design consultant for the project is Smallwood, Reynolds, Stewart, Stewart & Associates of the US.
The design concept of the West Bay complex is based on the Alhambra complex in Granada, Spain, which incorporates individual elements of a fortress, a palace and a residential area into one entity.
The architectural design of the project is inspired by Islamic and Qatari influences, reflected by the appearance of the buildings and the use of architectural features such as windtowers, patterned cladding panels, architectural feature arches and columns and rooftop domes on all the towers.
The complex is built on a 5.54-hectare site and has three main entrances with landscaped areas as well as separate service drives to loading docks. The design features user-friendly auto drop-off in all buildings.
The construction of the project was a challenge in view of its scale and the fast-track completion envisaged.
“Since we started on all four towers simultaneously – each a major project in itself - the contract has involved a great deal of planning and international procurement. With time being a major constraint, CDC had to allocate a large fleet of equipment and extensive resources to the project,” says Elias.
The complex sits on some 1,700 piles and has a raft foundation. Being a coastal location, dewatering was a major issue and was carried out for eight to 10 months, according to Elias.
High-strength concrete has been used for this prestigious project, work on which was speeded up by the use of Doka tableforms and flying forms, he adds.
The façades of the buildings are clad with precast elements comprising white stone and white cement. These panels were imported from Abu Dhabi as the local market could not cope with the large volumes of elements required, according to Elias.
Established in 1982, CDC is a registered grade “A” construction and development company which specialises in project solutions in areas like civil engineering, construction, oil and gas development and infrastructure development.
A leader in construction, CDC’s name is associated with most of Doha’s major landmarks such as Alfardan commercial centre, BMW showroom, Al Bustan and Al Jasmine residential complexes, Commercial Bank of Qatar, Qatar Industrial Manufacturing Company (QIMCO) headquarters, among others.