Triton Construction has been appointed to deliver full below ground civils enabling and infrastructure works for a new state of the art pathology laboratory at St James's Hospital in Leeds.

The contract comprises large below ground pre-cast concrete ductways and cast in situ re-enforced transitions to existing service tunnels, all on a very busy live hospital site requiring very close co-ordination with the Hospital Trust and other contractors working in the same vicinity.

The works are the pre-cursor for the new multi-million-pound Pathology building, being delivered by main contractor, BAM Construction, that will support hospitals across the region to improve diagnostics for patients and help to meet the growing regional demand for specialist treatment and care.

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In February the laboratory, which will also serve hospitals in West Yorkshire and Harrogate, was given the go ahead by the Department of Health and Social Care, which allowed construction to start in April.

The new building is expected to be operational in the autumn of 2023 and will allow the Trust to incorporate pathology services currently housed in outdated facilities in the Old Medical School at LGI as well as some of those delivered from St James's University Hospital.

Triton moved on site last month to start works in providing serviceable underground routes from the existing Gledhow building to the new laboratory. The route will house high voltage power cables and pneumatic ducts that will send samples from one building to another.

Paul Clarkson, Managing Director at Triton Construction, said: "This is a specialist project for which we are highly experienced to deliver. Our team is creating a 4m wide, 1.8m deep underground network of below ground systems that can connect to existing provisions and includes the installation of around 190 ducts covering 200 metres each pre-cast segment weighing over 2 tonnes. We are also installing robust traffic management measures during the course of the project due to high footfall and vehicle movements."