Holiday Inn Express & Crowne Plaza Hotels, Aberdeen Airport

Our role in the project

Our involvement began at the detailed design stage, with a remit to complete the projects' acoustic component of the building warrant application.

We also assisted during the project and at the end of the project.

Specific considerations

• Ground noise break-in from adjacent airport
• Free track helicopter noise and vibration
• High hotel operator standards
• Scottish planning process and building standards

Acoustic features of this project

We had to address two specific challenges on this project.

Firstly, Scotland's building standards vary slightly to those of England and Wales:

• Once planning permission is granted, a building warrant is then required before construction can actually start;
• There is no equivalent to England and Wales' 'Rooms for Residential Purposes' in Scotland's building standards.

Secondly, the flight paths at Aberdeen airport are defined in accordance with European Directives. These flight paths exclude free track helicopters which meant we had to:

• Conduct a desktop study using proprietary known helicopter noise and vibration levels;
• Use the results of the desktop study to determine if/where there could be any reduction in glazing specification in different parts of each hotel.

The free track helicopter paths made it impossible to accurately predict where any helicopter noise would come from and where, within the hotels, it would have most impact. As a result, the glazing and façade specifications had to make allowances for the possibility that a helicopter could fly very close to or directly over the top of the hotels.