Making Waves - Canberra's Newest Sporting Landmark

The Australian Capital Territory's newest sports and recreational facility is set to impress, with its state of the art facilities and iconic design. The A$23 million Canberra International Sports and Aquatic Centre (CISAC) is a world class facility, developed to provide Canberra residents with opportunities for participation in a wide range of healthy activities.

Located in the Canberra suburb of Belconnen, the centre boasts a 50 metre competition pool, a 25 metre warm up pool, a timing system, and much more. The centre was developed, constructed, and is being managed by Sport Centres Australia, a company that specialises in sport and recreational facilities.

"The project started off as a Government tender, which encompassed a few core facilities, a 50 metre eight lane pool, a three lane 25 metre pool, a timing system, plus spectator seating for 800," says John Konstantinou of Sport Centres Australia. "Now, in our tender for the project, we went one better than these requirements, we provided an 10 lane pool, which is an Olympic sized pool, we went from a three lane to a five lane lap pool, and we put the timing system in, as well as capacity for 900 spectators to be seated."

The CISAC also includes a steam room, a 20 person spa, an indoor waterslide, leisure pool with water features, a whirlpool, as well as a kiosk, retail store, and indoor sports courts. Located upstairs is Canberra's largest premium gym, which covers over 2,000 square metres. The complex also offers meeting and conference room space for hire. A medical centre, hydrotherapy pool and all day child care facility is currently under completion.

Situated on a 38,000 square metres site, the substantial building covers 11,500 square metres. Despite the project's size, it was constructed in a relatively short period of time. "The initial tenders for the project went out in early 2001," explains John. "The actual construction period took less time than it did to negotiate everything it was built in a little over 12 months from start to finish."

However, there were some challenges to be overcome on the project. In order to allow the roof to clear span the centre's pool area, which is 46 metres wide, seven enormous trusses had to be fabricated and shipped to Canberra. Each measuring 47 metres in length, the massive steel trusses had to be fabricated in three sections and erected on site.

"The size of the site, which is huge, and the size of the trusses that we had to install, given the the span of the roof, were definitely the most challenging aspects of the project," says John. "We lifted the trusses up in pairs, all in one day. We also had to make sure all of the exposed structural steel in the pool area underwent a three coat paint process on it for corrosion protection, the white paint on the exposed steel is actually a special epoxy coat to minimise corrosion."

"The rest of the building was a lot simpler as all the facilities such as the amenities, toilets for house, pool and courts are in the spine of the structure," he adds.

But it's not just what's inside that counts. The exterior of the complex incorporates a striking, architecturally designed facade in bold, primary colours, with dramatic structural curves and shapes.

3,000 square metres of LYSAGHT CUSTOM ORB® clads the facade, in spectacular stripes of Shale Grey™ and Deep Ocean® COLORBOND® steel.

"The architect, Peter Hunt, had built something similar to this before," says John. "Initially, we did have a lot more stripes around the building, but then minimised it to just have the stripes on the LYSAGHT® cladding. We wanted a common theme across the building, with the blue and the white, which looks great. We felt that on the big expanses of cladding, having just one colour would look a lot less interesting, so we decided to incorporate these two tones. As you can see, it's worked very well the colours have given the building a certain 'wow' factor."

11,000 square metres of LYSAGHT SPANDEK® in Shale Grey™ COLORBOND® steel was used for the building's curving roof. A strong, lightweight profile, LYSAGHT SPANDEK® is ideal for applications where a bold, contemporary appearance is required. It combines strength, impact resistance and economy, and is perfect for large sprung curved roofs.

All of the roofing and cladding for the project was done by leading Canberra roofing company, Territory Commercial Roofing. "This was a good job for us," says Pat Skeers from Territory Commercial Roofing. "The LYSAGHT® roofing and cladding went on without a hitch, it's a great product that's why we use LYSAGHT® exclusively for all of our jobs. The project has been very successful."