Market Way, 100 Franklin Street

Forty levels of student accommodation on a tight CBD block, and no sensible way to run alarm cable up and down a structure that was still going up. That was the starting position at Market Way, Multiplex's purpose-built student accommodation project at 100 Franklin Street in Melbourne.

We supplied the construction site alarm system for the build. Every level got a Cygnus SiteProtect evacuation siren and first aid call point, with no cabling between them.

The project

Market Way sits in the Queen Victoria Market precinct, a short walk from RMIT and the University of Melbourne. Multiplex is delivering 715 rooms and 1,010 student beds across 40 levels for Journal Student Living, a joint venture between Brookfield Asset Management and Journal. The build includes more than 3,000 square metres of communal space. It also retains and structurally upgrades the heritage-listed Burbank House on the same site.

It is a vertical build on a constrained footprint. Levels open up week by week and the trades move with them.

The problem: alarm coverage that will not stay still

A hardwired temporary alarm system assumes the building stops changing. On a high-rise build it never does. Every time a floor tops out, the cable run extends. Every time a level changes use, devices move and terminations get redone. On a 40-level structure that is a recurring cost and a recurring gap in coverage.

Height creates the second problem. A worker on level 32 who goes down is a long way from the gate and the ambulance. WorkSafe Victoria's guidance on effective emergency response plans expects principal contractors to plan for sudden incapacity of workers in hard-to-access locations. It also expects them to account for how emergency services will reach the point of an emergency. Shouting up a stairwell is not a plan.

What we supplied

Multiplex went with Cygnus SiteProtect call point units on every level. Each unit puts two emergencies on one device. The green button raises a first aid alert with a distinct intermittent tone across the site. An evacuation triggered from the control panel sounds a continuous 110dB alarm with a strobe on the same unit. Nobody on the floor has to work out which alarm they are hearing.

The units talk to each other over a mesh network, and every unit repeats for the others. Adding a device extends coverage rather than straining it. That matters when the building grows a level at a time.

Why it suited the build:

• No cabling between levels and no repeaters or boosters to install
• Each unit named by location in software, so devices move with the work
• Single battery pack rated to at least 12 months in normal operation
• 110dB evacuation siren with high intensity LED strobe
• IP65 enclosure, so units handle open floors and weather exposure
• Positioned, named and monitored by the site team without specialist trades

The outcome

The Multiplex project manager had run the system with us before. Rather than buy a fresh install, the team brought the existing Cygnus units onto Market Way and added stock for the extra levels.

That is the part worth noting. A wireless system is site equipment. It demobilises with the rest of the gear, goes into storage and deploys again on the next job. The cost sits with the first project. The value carries across every one after it.

We supplied the same system to the New Footscray Hospital build. There, 149 first aid alarm units cover a $1.5 billion hospital development in Melbourne's west.

Planning temporary alarm coverage on a high-rise or a staged build? Call us on 1800 273 473 and we will work through the level count and the unit numbers before you price it.