Civils giants join forces for Crossrail tunnel bid

Four of the biggest names in tunneling have joined forces to bid for the Crossrail tunnel contracts announced earlier today.

BBMV is a London-based joint venture comprising Balfour Beatty, Beton- und Monierbau, Morgan Est and Vinci Construction.

All four businesses have a solid record of delivering major infrastructure schemes in London and throughout the world and promise to provide the full range of skills, resources and technical expertise required for such a large-scale project.

Peter Mason, BBMV’s bid director, said: "We are delighted to formally announce the BBMV team and confirm its commitment to seek prequalification to bid for major packages associated with the Crossrail programme.

"The scale of this project requires a very specialist team which possesses not only the technical and resource capability, but which also has a comprehensive understanding of both the local issues and the requirements of the key stakeholders involved. The BBMV partners and their supply chain have been very carefully selected to provide the best value to Crossrail and to give the confidence that this scheme can be delivered to time and budget.

"We believe BBMV represents the best in the construction industry in terms of the realisation of this scheme. We have a good appreciation for Transport for London’s objectives, processes and needs and are committed to encouraging a more inclusive and diverse workforce, which will contribute, not only to a highly successful project, but also leave a legacy of a skills-enriched London workforce."
 
The partners have recently been involved with the construction of the northern ticket hall and western ticket hall at Kings Cross, the East London Line Extension, Docklands Light Railway 3 Car project, T5 rail and road tunnels at Heathrow airport, DLR Woolwich Arsenal Station Extension, A3 Hindhead Tunnel and CTRL 410 North Downs Tunnel.

The team’s combined strengths include earth pressure balance and slurry tunnelling, sprayed concrete lined tunnels and cavern construction, major station construction, railway systems integration and heavy civil engineering. This technical expertise is leveraged with detailed local knowledge of underground construction in the soils beneath London. Additional strength will be added to the team by BBMV’s specialist in-house businesses including Bachy Soletanche, Balfour Beatty Ground Engineering and Morgan Est Piling.

BBMV has established a dedicated central London office from which it will focus on Crossrail.