Nobina’s new electric bus depot completed in seven months with project management services
Nobina’s all-electric bus depot in Oulu was completed for operation in just seven months and within the target budget in the midst of the winter’s coldest temperatures. Sweco’s project management service was chosen as the method of implementation of the project, to which all parties were committed.
Project management service ensured the construction schedule and budget
Nobina, the largest bus operator in the Nordic countries, has been operating in the Helsinki Metropolitan Area and the Turku region for a long time. In the summer of 2024, electric bus services were also launched in Oulu.
“In Turku, all of our fleets are electric, and more than half of them are already in the HSL area, and now the new electric buses also support the reduction of traffic emissions in the City of Oulu,” says Janne Pusa, Development Manager at Nobina.
At the end of 2023, there was still forest growing on the depot plot, but traffic was supposed to start on 3 June. The construction of the electric bus depot was only seven months away. Sweco’s construction management experts proposed a project management service (PJP) as the form of implementation. Its advantage is that the project can be implemented in a shorter time and at a lower cost.
“In the PJP implementation, we bear all the responsibilities of the main contractor and take care of, for example, the monitoring of the schedule and budget, as well as procurement,” says Juha Mäkelä, Construction Director at Sweco.
According to Pusa, competent support in construction was important to Nobina, because the operator must be able to focus on starting the service. In order for the business to be profitable, the construction process must be extremely cost-effective, right down to the grassroots level.
“Sweco’s project management gave us confidence that we had competent help to run the project, and Juha kept the pack together with a steady hand.”
The depot for more than 40 electric buses was completed on schedule and below the target budget. Pusa believes that it would have been difficult to make the project successful with the traditional project model. The project management service enabled a more agile way to start construction work, even though the planning was still in progress.
“The implementation was clearly faster, and I can definitely recommend the project management service for projects where there is a lot of time pressure and a need for cost monitoring.”
The goal of site management is the quality and safety of construction
In the implementation of the depot project, site management experience was an important part of schedule, quality and cost management. Sweco’s experts discussed directly with each service provider coming to the site, which ensured that the different phases were carried out at just the right time.
“We only selected suppliers for the site that we knew were absolutely reliable,” Mäkelä emphasises. Close cooperation with the site ensured the quality and safety of the work. “There were no occupational accidents, even though the frame phase coincided with the most severe frosts of the winter, which slowed down or stopped work completely on 17 days.”
Structural solutions saved implementation time
Sweco was also involved in the HVAC and structural design of the bus depot. Nobina set clear goals for the design. “We will be operating in Oulu for decades, so we wanted a building that would last, but cost-effectively without anything extra,” Pusa says.
The depot was built with a steel frame and wooden roof elements. “It was an economical and functional solution in which the roof could be installed on top of the frame quickly,” says Sweco’s structural designer and site engineer Henry Pått.
The special features of the HVAC design were the ATEX facilities and the washing equipment for the buses. In addition, HVAC technology had to support the client’s operations in a variety of ways. “That’s why we designed an extensive commodity network for both oils and compressed air,” says Olli Koivisto, Head of Sweco’s HVAC Design Department, who was also responsible for the HVAC supervision of the site.
The PJP implementation enables the presence of designers on the site, for example, in the role of site engineer. It gives designers valuable site experience and enables the development of design solutions. “For example, we replaced the surface slab with a Plaano screed that dries faster than concrete, and the structures of the bus charging points were made of concrete elements that were simply lifted into place.”
Mäkelä praises the commitment of both Nobina and the entire design and construction site organisation to the common goals. “The PJP implementation does not let anyone off the hook, but when cooperation works and everyone is ready to be flexible, the end result meets the client’s goals.”