Winvic and its client IM Properties have opened a satellite Sustainability and Innovation Hub at the 96 ha Mercia Park logistics site in Leicestershire.
The Hub comprises three zones – Sustainability, Innovation and Learning – that provide areas to showcase Mercia Park’s sustainability credentials, demonstrate Winvic’s digital advancements, train Winvic’s staff and supply chain and inspire young people through educational visits.
Its proximity to Winvic’s Future of Construction training centre also means both facilities can be used for linked training activities. One key feature of the Hub is a 360-degree BIM Cave, which will aid the BIM design process in a real-time scenario by facilitating design team meetings and workshops and help develop VR imagery for health and safety training. Unlike the BIM Cave located at Winvic’s Centre for Innovative Construction, it is a 360-degree resource where VR 3D design models can be viewed as an immersive room experience, without a headset.
The Hub also features an interactive meeting room, training and learning space and an area with a 3D printer. Visitors, such as school, college and university students, can also get hands on with Winvic’s digital operation and maintenance manuals, whereby they can access sections of a design manual, maintenance guidance or 360-degree photos by using QR codes, in the same way end users can within their finished building.
Winvic technical director Tim Reeve, who sits on the company’s sustainability leadership team, said: “The Sustainability and Innovation Hub – the second facility we have launched with IM Properties at Mercia Park in a matter of weeks – is testament to both companies’ commitment to the future of construction, which has sustainability and innovation at its very heart.
“Mercia Park’s green and state-of-the-art digital credentials make it the ideal location for the facility. It’s not only an operational digital design centre for Winvic, IM Properties, consultants and suppliers to utilise, but it also showcases the scheme and our team’s innovative initiatives and acts as an education and training centre for young people in the community. We’re now looking forward to welcoming schools, colleges and universities, as well as more companies in our supply chain, to the Hub.”
