Over two thousand precast concrete elements

Stairs, balconies, landings, columns, walls, facade elements and brackets

Mombarg Beton supplied concrete stairs, landings, columns and walls, balconies, facade elements and consoles for the high tower (Block 1) and parking garage (Block 5) of new construction project Binck City Park in The Hague. In total, no fewer than 2,100 concrete elements were involved.

Mombarg Beton supplies high-quality precast concrete elements. With some sixty employees, the company mainly produces stairs, balconies and walls, mostly for apartment construction. Mombarg delivers throughout the Netherlands, particularly to medium and large contractors. Director Frank van der Drift: "We take on orders including in-house engineering. Because we have our own draftsmen, we are somewhat more flexible and can also advise on certain solutions during the process. Besides producing concrete elements for residential construction, we also produce manholes for technical installations, for example, and concrete cellars for under houses. This year we launched a third business unit: prefabbetononline.nl. There, handy do-it-yourselfers, self-employed workers and small contractors can order complex concrete elements online. For example, stairs and balconies. This is a unique concept that we are now giving some momentum to. We knew there would be demand for it and we are currently fine-tuning the whole process." 

Advice on solutions and detailing

Mombarg Beton has long been a supplier to VORM Bouw, including for other projects in The Hague. For Binck City Park, the concrete builder was involved at an early stage. Van der Drift: "Even in the preliminary phase, we advised on solutions and detailing. Then we made some prototypes and samples. For example, the sides of the balcony slab will have a certain profiling, which the architect wanted to see in real life. Also, different colors of concrete are used, which we made samples of. There were several sessions with the architect and the contractor and that was a fun quest." 

Then came the global cost estimates, and eventually this led to quite a large order. For Block 1, the tall tower, Mombarg supplied various components for each floor. These included stairs, landings, columns and walls, balconies, facade elements and brackets. Because the company has a large storage area, it was no problem to keep stock and deliver just-in-time. For Block 5, the parking garage, Mombarg supplied concrete columns, walls and beams. The walls contained some challenging detailing, such as round holes, that caused some headaches structurally. "We got out of that, too, in the end. The result is a nice interplay of concrete walls and columns with hollow-core slab floors."

For Mombarg, the work on this project is now over. Van der Drift looks back on it with satisfaction. "We have a pleasant, good cooperation with this contractor. The communication is smooth and the people are also knowledgeable about the content. In general, we are on the same page."