Southlands Hospital, West Sussex

Kier Southern contracted Broxap to provide a fabric tensile walkway at this working hospital. The aim was to protect patients and ambulance crews visiting the new Ophthalmology Department of the main hospital. As such, Broxap utilised their Keep it Kool Mandeville canopy design to create this bespoke, waterproof fabric, tensile walkway.

Being a working hospital meant the allowance for heavy machinery was complex and, subsequently, this restricted the installation.

However, this type of installation environment was nothing new for Broxap!

We worked with both Southlands Hospital and contractors to keep installation noise and machinery to a minimum, remaining unobtrusive to visiting patients along with staff.

The complexity of the required path for the tensile walkway (traversing around corners and between buildings) required the waterproof fabric canopy to incorporate a bespoke drainage system. This differed from the standard shelter design.

Broxap designed and manufactured the walkway and installed it onsite during hospital hours; we erected 66,000.00mm length of canopy in total, incorporating an integral gutter and down-pipes to discharge at ground level. The fabric membrane is waterproof and tensioned to the main structure.