Trainees from Balfour Beatty will be the first to experience the CIOB-backed new ACT-UK Simulation Centre when it opens this September.

The training course prepared by ACT-UK in collaboration with Balfour Beatty - which has been closely involved in the centre's development - will be the first to run at the new leading-edge training facility in Coventry.

The £8.7 million Coventry centre will deliver construction management training featuring a pioneering form of simulation training combining virtual reality and professional actors.

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Shaylor Construction will complete the Simulation Centre building this month with work now starting on the centre fit-out.

Simulation and 3D visualisation experts at Brighton-based Makemedia have unveiled images of the virtual construction sites that will play a key role in its training programmes. The virtual 3D models, recreating in precise detail the build process for two actual construction schemes, will be projected on the centre's 180' 12 metre-long panoramic screen. Trainees will use a joystick to 'fly' through the virtual building site, go inside properties under construction and inspect building work in detail.

Actors and supervisors who will work at the UK centre are currently undergoing intensive training courses in the UK and at the Dutch Building Management Simulation Centre (BMSC) in Leeuwarden which is the model for the UK centre.

(CD/JM)