Two month extension for King Abdullah International Gardens bid deadline

21 June 2010

$200m contract covers external construction services for the site and building

The commercial and technical bid deadline for the main $200m construction contract on Riyadh’s King Abdullah International Gardens (Kaig) project has been extended to by two months.  

The state-run King Abdullah International Gardens Committee has set a new bid deadline of 3 July. Contractors began preparing bids for the project in early March and were working to an original deadline of 16 May, but the client agreed to give contractors more time to finalise bids (MEED 11:3:10).

At least six contractors are bidding on the contract. They include the local firms Saudi Oger and Saudi Binladin Group as well as South Korea’s Samsung Corporation.There are at least three more construction groups bidding for the contract, says a source close to the project without giving further details.

The project’s centrepiece will be a 40-metre-high crescent-shaped plant laboratory and indoor botanical garden. The building’s roof will have a span of up to 90 metres and will be one of the world’s largest tensile fabric-covered structure.

The main construction package includes all external construction services on the 1.6 million square-metre site as well as a 100,000 sq m building.

UAE-based Al-Arif Trading & Contracting was awarded a contract in late-2008 to prepare the 1.6 million square-metre site and establish perimeter fencing around the project. This first phase is scheduled to be complete by the time bids are submitted in July.

The local Omrania & Associates (O&A) is providing site management and construction supervision.

Detailed design, construction documentation and other building services were carried out by a joint venture of UK consultants Barton Willmore and Buro Happold.

Barton Willmore provided masterplanning, architecture and landscape design services, while Buro Happold provided structural engineering, building services and infrastructure engineering design.

Infrastructure design included earthworks, roads, footpaths, car parks, sewerage treatment systems and facilities for electricity, telecoms, gas and water.

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