Crane assembly work at a major residential development in London is now complete.

The heavy lifting crane, the largest in the city, is now ready to begin work on site at the Earls Court development.

Property developer Capital & Counties Properties (Capco) is creating 8,000 new homes, including a new High Street and a five-acre park, at Earls Court in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea.

Kelbray, which is overseeing the site works at Earls Court, has completed demolition of the former exhibition centres to ground level after two years of intensive work on site.

As the largest lifting capacity crane ever to be used in London, the machine is 120 metres in height and more than twice the heigh of Nelson's Column's. It will operate only on the Earls Court site and will not oversail any of the nearby properties.

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The crane will lift 61 'portal beams' out from over the London Underground lines that lie below the former exhibition centres. The large beams supported the weight of the exhibition centre and need to be removed to enable development on site.

The smallest beam is 80 tonnes with the largest beam weighing 1,500 tonnes. The crane was specifically chosen as the optimum engineering solution and the method has been designed to minimise the impact on local residents, to help reduce the carbon footprint of the project and will significantly shorten the project timescales.

David Rowe, Technical Manager for Keltbray, said: "By utilising this crane and lifting method, disruption is minimised and the crane's high capacity and precision lifting technology will reduce the overall project timescale considerably.

"With the successful demolition of the former exhibition centres last year the lifting of the large portal beams is the next big task at Earls Court as we prepare the site for construction. The project team has worked tirelessly to ensure the most appropriate technology was chosen and implemented in order to minimise disruption to our neighbours."

The first lifts will take place later this month, with portal beams being lifted overnight in 'engineering hours' after the last District Line train has passed through the tunnels underneath the beams.

Work is expected to finish by the end of this year, when the crane will be dismantled and leave Earls Court.

(LM/MH)