Heathrow Airport’s oldest terminal, the original Terminal 2 which opened in 1955, was demolished in 2009 to make way for the new £2.3 Billion Terminal 2. Named The Queens Terminal it covers a span of 210,000m2, or the equivalent of 25 football pitches.

Cousins experience of airport projects at London’s Gatwick Airport, and the ability to deliver major development projects, resourcing fast-track, high resource programmes, in many instances alongside Laing O’Rourke, saw us chosen as the decorator for the Terminal 2A standard decoration package of £800,000.00.

Sector
Airport

Client
HAL (Heathrow Airport Ltd)

CA
Hetco (Laing O’Rourke and Ferrovial joint venture)

Location
Heathrow Airport

Value
£2.5 Million

Completion
June 2014

Project tasks and challenges


The contract awarded was predominantly the painting of plasterboard surfaces within Heathrow Terminal 2. This grew over the 3 years on site to include re-painting of the finish coatings of the structural steel within the terminal, and full decoration of the new car park constructed alongside the terminal.

 The project consisted of huge open plan areas of public terminal spaces, vast baggage management halls, and miles of corridors of back of house plant rooms and staff areas over 6 storeys.

Cousins project management team allocated a labour resource across these areas, ensuring programme dates were adhered to. This meant handover of areas to Heathrow Airport were achieved in time to enable airline fit out, baggage management testing, and staff training to proceed prior to the official opening by HM The Queen. At the peak of the programme Cousins resourced reached a high of 65 decorators working during the day, and 35 during a nightshift.

Due to the huge resource and efforts afforded to the project it achieved its completion date of June 2014, in time to welcome its first flight at 5.49am on 4th June 2014 and the official opening by Queen Elizabeth II 23rd June 2014.