Enabling delivery within a constrained high-rise environment
NG Bailey is delivering the mechanical and public health infrastructure for 1 North Quay, a major high-rise commercial development at Canary Wharf. The project involves the installation and integration of complex shell and core services across a large-scale, multi-storey structure, requiring a highly coordinated approach to design, sequencing and installation within a constrained urban environment.
The scope includes the delivery of low temperature hot water (LTHW), chilled water (CHW), domestic water systems, drainage and specialist services such as laboratory gases, all distributed across the building through a dense and highly coordinated vertical and horizontal services network. The scale of the development, combined with the complexity of the building core and the number of interfaces across trades, requires careful alignment between design, construction and logistics to maintain programme certainty.
Driving coordinated delivery, buildability and programme certainty through offsite manufacturing
A key element of the delivery strategy is the use of offsite-manufactured riser modules to support vertical services distribution, enabling large sections of coordinated infrastructure to be installed efficiently within the building core. These modules integrate multiple services within a single system and are manufactured in a controlled factory environment, allowing welding, testing and pre-snagging to be completed prior to installation, improving quality and reducing on-site rework.
The use of modularisation enables manufacture to be decoupled from site constraints, supporting parallel working and improving installation sequencing across the programme. This is particularly critical in a high-rise environment where access, space and trade interfaces are tightly constrained. Installation of the modules requires detailed planning and strict operational control, including lift strategies, wind management and coordination with other trades, ensuring safe and efficient delivery within a live construction environment.
By shifting labour-intensive activities off site, the approach significantly reduces high-risk operations such as working at height and within confined riser spaces, while also reducing site congestion and improving productivity. The removal of over 28,000 hours from site activity, combined with industrialised production and coordinated delivery, contributes to a programme saving equivalent to approximately six months for a team of 30 operatives.
More broadly, the approach supports a more predictable and controlled delivery model, reducing reliance on sequential site-based activities, improving buildability and lowering commercial and programme risk. In addition to programme and productivity gains, the reduction in embodied carbon and site activity supports wider sustainability and operational objectives across the development.