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Project
Building The Shard, London Bridge
John Parker, Technical Director WSP Cantor Seinuk, describes the challenges of
working on the foundations of the tallest building in Europe
The Shard at London Bridge will not only be the tallest building in
Europe, it will also be one of the most distinctive. Its 310m high,
tapering shape and glass cladding will provide a unique addition to
London’s skyline when it is completed in 2012 (Fig 1).
Although the shape of the building is unusual, it is ideal for its
mixed use occupancy. Deep floor plates at the lower levels are
provided for office tenants, medium sized floor plates at mid-height
suit the restaurants and hotel, while the smallest floors at the top
of the building allow natural light to penetrate through the
residential apartments. At the highest point (the ‘spire’) is a viewing
gallery, from which the public will be able to enjoy spectacular
views across the capital.
Piling for the building began in March 2009 following the
demolition of the 26-storey Southwark Towers. Engineer WSP
Cantor Seinuk and architect Renzo Piano Building Workshop have
designed a building for client Sellar Property Group that completely
fills the site adjacent to Network Rail’s station. Main contractor
Mace and its subcontractors have a complex logistical task to
build the tower, while avoiding disruption to the busy station. A
view of the site in June 2009 is shown in Fig 2.
Basement
The Shard has a three storey basement occupied by plant rooms,
a mechanical car stacker, ‘back of house’ rooms for the hotel and
14 The Structural Engineer 87 (18) 15 September 2009
such like. It is surrounded by a concrete secant piled wall; the floor
slabs are also constructed in reinforced concrete.
The lowest slab is 13.34m below ground level and acts as a raft
to transfer building loads into the bearing piles. Under the main
core it is 3m thick; elsewhere it is generally reduced to 1.5m. A
drainage layer beneath the raft reduces uplift pore pressures.
London Bridge station is constructed on Victorian brick arches
which, in some cases, are very close to the secant wall. In order to
safeguard these assets a complex monitoring system has been
specified by WSP Geotechnics. This uses a combination of
automatic and manual monitoring to report movements in Network
Rail structures and tracks, and in other surrounding buildings. An
Emergency Preparedness Plan details the actions to be taken in
the event that movements are greater than predicted by WSP’s
ground movement assessment (GMA).
The Jubilee Line passes the site near the northern edge.
1 The Shard as it will appear on the London skyline
(Photo: Sellar Properties)
2 The site in June 2006, with three piling rigs working
(Photo: Nicola Evans, WSP Cantor Seinuk)
2a The site from above taken from New London Bridge
House to the north of the Shard
3 Opposite: Plunge column alignment rig
(Photo: Nicola Evans, WSP Cantor Seinuk )
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New piles have been positioned to avoid the London Underground Stratum Approx depth to base of stratum below ground level
exclusion zone, and the GMA shows that effects on the tunnel are
minimal. Other nearby London Underground assets include two Made ground / alluvium 4.5m
long-disused shafts on the line of the western secant wall. One, a River terrace gravels 9m
stair shaft, had been filled with concrete in the 1950s, with some of
the stair steelwork left in place. Because it would not be possible London Clay 31m (west) / 35m (east)
to cut through the steel with the piling rig, the entire shaft was
Woolwich and Reading beds 45m (west) / 51m (east)
removed from within a temporary works coffer dam. The other, a
lift shaft, was filled with foam concrete before boring the secant Thanet sands 59m (west) / 63m (east)
piles. A disused tunnel, which previously provided access to the
shafts from the rest of London Bridge Underground station, was Chalk Not proven
also filled with foam concrete to avoid the risk of damage during Table 1: Sequence of strata
piling and basement excavation.

Bearing piles and secant wall

The sequence of strata at the site is summarised in Table 1. The
water table is at the top of the gravel layer, at about 4.5m below
ground level. The gravels are also extremely permeable and so
excavations into this layer must be made watertight so as to avoid
large flows of water. Although the top of the London Clay layer is
relatively level, its thickness changes abruptly due to a pre-glacial
fault running north-south. The lower strata are therefore
encountered at higher levels on the western side of the site than
on the east.
A greater complication than the geology, however, is provided by
the existing piles constructed in the 1970s to support Southwark
Towers. This building had no basement – only the lift pits and Price
Waterhouse Coopers’ swimming pool extended below ground
level – and so the engineers were able to use relatively shallow
under-reamed piles. This kept the pile toe levels in the London
Clay and avoided piling into the water-bearing strata beneath. The
under-reams were in some cases so close as to almost touch
each other, and so the new bearing piles are cored through the
unreinforced concrete of the under-reams using a core barrel with
3
cutting teeth mounted on the piling rig.
A record drawing of the Southwark Towers piling was used to
locate the new piles between the old piles. The drawing was a plunge columns to support the top-down construction. These
scanned image of a photocopy of a microfilm record of a hand- were installed by Stent to tight position and verticality tolerances
drawn original, and so it was necessary to scale, stretch and rotate using a hydraulically-controlled rig (Fig 3).
it in order to correct the various distortions that had occurred over The secant piles carry substantial loads from the perimeter
the years. Because coring through reinforced concrete was known columns as well as lateral loads from earth and water pressures.
to be a lengthy, difficult and noisy process, damaging to piling rigs, As for the bearing piles, the positions of the secant piles were
the new piles were positioned to avoid the shaft of the existing adjusted to avoid existing pile shafts. In some instances this has
piles. led to loads being transferred around obstructions by the capping
The bearing piles are generally 1800mm in diameter and carry beam. The secant piles are 900mm diameter and are installed at
up to 24MN. The piles with the heaviest loads extend to 53m 750mm maximum centres, and to a vertical tolerance of 1:200,
below ground level and are founded in the Thanet sands. Piles ensuring full interlock down to basement slab level. A drained
carrying lower loads are founded in the London Clay and are ‘dry’, cavity provides a further barrier to water ingress.
but the majority are constructed under bentonite because of the A soil-structure interaction model has been used to calculate
water-bearing strata at lower levels. Some piles contain steel bending moments, shear forces and reinforcement requirements in
the raft, and to show how much vertical load can be carried as
bearing pressure on the London Clay. This avoids over-specifying
pile loads and limits the amount of heave movement due to the
removal of soil within the basement. The raft slab is reinforced with
up to four layers of 40mm bars in each direction, but deepening
the slab would have led to more excavation and greater forces in
the secant piles.

Top-down construction
The Shard basement is being built ‘top down’. This allows
substructure and superstructure construction to proceed
simultaneously, giving considerable programme benefits. In
addition, by installing slabs as excavation proceeds, the deflection
of the secant wall, and the risk of movement in the surrounding
structures, are both minimised. The sequence is complex but can
be summarised as follows:
– Install secant piles, bearing piles and plunge columns, working
from ground level (Fig 4).
– Construct level 00 (ground floor) slab, leaving an opening
around the core and moling holes for removal of spoil.
– Excavate to B2 level (the slab at B1 does not cover the whole
basement; it is also safer to excavate double storey heights
2a

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4 5
6 7
4 Sequence: piles and plunge columns
installed from ground level
5 Sequence: level 00 cast; core started from B2
6 Sequence: B2 cast; plunge columns propped
from B3; steelwork started
7 Sequence: completed building (Photos: John
Parker, WSP Cantor Seinuk
when working top down).
– Build a section of the core at B2 and commence the slipform.
The core is supported on plunge columns, using large numbers
of shear studs (Fig 5)
– Cast the B2 slab, again leaving an opening around the core.
– When the slipform has passed ground level, fill in the central
opening and tie the core to the level 00 slab.
– Meanwhile, excavate to B3 level. The depth of the raft slab and
the B3-B2 storey height effectively provide a double height
space.
– When the slipform has passed level 08, commence steel
erection.
– Cast the B3 slab; brace the core plunge columns laterally from
the slab (Fig 6).
– Complete the core walls from B3 to B2, fill in the B2 slab
opening and remove the plunge column bracing. At this stage
the slipform will be at about level 30, with the steelwork a few
floors beneath.
– A section through the lower part of the completed building is
shown in Fig 7.
It is believed that plunge columns have not previously been used
to support the core of a major building. The main challenge was in
positioning them so as to provide a balanced support beneath the
16 The Structural Engineer 87 (18) 15 September 2009
core, and avoid eccentricity between the core centroid and the
centroid of the group of plunge columns. This was further
complicated by the need to position plunge columns away from
core openings, and to ensure that the new piles did not clash with
existing pile shafts. After some iteration a suitable arrangement
was devised. The surprisingly high accuracy of the CAD overlay of
the existing pile drawing led to only minor changes after the
Southwark Towers pilecaps were demolished; nevertheless the pile
group was re-analysed in order to ensure that pile loads and
settlements would be acceptable.
Conclusion
The foundations for the Shard at London Bridge present a
challenge for designers and contractors because of the size and
weight of the building, the presence of existing under-reamed
piles, and the proximity of Network Rail and other infrastructure.
Careful design and close teamwork by structural and geotechnical
engineers, architects, main contractor and piling subcontractor has
led to a practical and efficient result.
Credits:
Client: Sellar Property Group Ltd
Structural and geotechnical engineer: WSP Cantor Seinuk
Architect: Renzo Piano Building Workshop
Associate architect: Adamson Associates
Building services engineer: Arup
Cost consultant: Davis Langdon
Project manager: Turner and Townsend
Main contractor: Mace
Piling subcontractor: Stent Foundations
Concrete subcontractor: Byrne Brothers
Steel subcontractor: Severfield Reeve