Greater Toronto Airports Authority – Central De-icing Facility

Milman & Associates in a Joint Venture with WZMH Architects are providing prime consulting and architectural and structural design services for a new 7,300 m2 Airside Operations Building at Toronto Pearson Airport to support the facility’s aircraft De-icing Programs. An essential process during the winter months, aircraft de-icing is undertaken on designated pads at the Central De-icing Facility (CDF). The scope included exploring options for either expanding the existing de-icing building or build an entirely new facility. Our team developed different options to expand the existing CDF building, and several alternatives for a new facility. It was decided to construct a new facility in order to minimize disruption to CDF activities during construction. This option allows the existing CDF building and control centre to remain as a backup.
Our team worked with GTAA and CDF management to identify the best location and configuration of the new building and site in order to satisfy the program of requirements.
We used the following strategies to manage the cost and schedule during the life of this project:
-Definition of the Scope of Work with key stakeholder groups; Establishment of a Budget; and Value Management/Value Engineering.
Site constraints posed the largest challenge to the design.
The site is very congested; it is surrounded by Britannia Road, a “Pink” snow area, buried Tank 3, future buried Tank 4, and a main entrance access and NAVCAN tower. Significant ground slopes were a challenge to site maneuvering and drainage.