CoombsBarei – Breaking new ground

CoombsBarei – Breaking new groundCoombsBarei are enjoying new project territory in South Australia by constructing the $17m Marindale Aged Care Facility at Gawler. In project dollar value this is by far the largest project that CoombBarei has undertaken. The 9,600m2 (gross floor area) building has 4 levels. There is a basement carpark plus 3 upper levels which consist of 126 bedrooms with ensuites, communal living areas and complete care service provisions such as kitchen, cafe, laundry and offices.The site was particularly difficult. As well as being adjacent to a heritage building, it was on a steep slope that was previously partly used as a dumping ground. Sloping by 13m from the front of the 80m deep site to the rear, it was excavated down 4m to the new basement level, whilst the lower half of the site was excavated, sifted and built up 9m to the same basement level requiring a series of retaining walls erected prior to piling. General Manager of CoombsBarei Constructions, Kevin Webb, says that he thanks both the Bennett Aged Care Group and Pruszinski Architects who have bestowed confidence in CoombsBarei to deliver their project. “The owners of CoombsBarei engaged me to make a difference in how the company is perceived in the market place”, Kevin said. “This project was an ideal target. Every builder has aged care in their sights. We were up against some well respected competition so we needed to be innovative in the way we presented our bid. Essentially we needed to provide a greater value for money to be considered. We also had to demonstrate the ability of our people. Our tender team and our proposed project team all have tier 1 experience so we needed to ensure the tender assessment team were aware of this to confidently present a recommendation to the client”. Elsewhere, whilst we continue to see limited levels of opportunity in the market place, CoombsBarei are maintaining a steady growth with work in hand and forecasting to double their turnover for a second financial year in a row.