Modern car park at Zollverein colliery

Between August 2017 and December 2018, new parking spaces for around 360 vehicles were provided on the site of the Zollverein coking plant, part of the Zollverein colliery, a world cultural heritage site in Essen in Germany’s Ruhr region. The ambitious new structure in the form of an open parking deck covered with a landscaped roof was built using concrete release agents, curing agents and concrete cosmetics from MC.
The building is a car “park” in two senses of the word – first there is its pure functionality as a repository for temporarily vacated vehicles, and then there is its innovatively greened roof slab, which serves as a small park with paths and seats, allowing people a place to stroll and relax. A rising reinforced concrete structure consisting of columns and wall sections supports the approximately 190 x 47 m reinforced concrete slab. The parking level itself was also designed with high aesthetics in mind. The single-storey deck was slightly lowered and blended with embankments to give the impression that the almost 9,000 m² roof slab was floating above ground level. In order to reinforce this impression, the architectural and planning team of Kadawittfeldarchitektur GmbH from Aachen opted for prefabricated concrete elements with multiple bends, which were assembled to form a peripheral roof edge.

 

Reliable demoulding

The contract for the construction work was awarded to Dressler Bau GmbH, Essen, with which MC has an excellent long-standing relationship. The proven concrete release agent Ortolan Basic 761 from MC was used in the manufacture of the precast elements for the wall and ceiling areas as well as for the columns. Solvent-free, low in odour and quickly biodegradable, it offers excellent environmental credentials. It is easy to use, weather-resistant and ensures clean demoulding, with a correspondingly high quality of concrete surface resulting. For the roof edge, the planning team chose a black-dyed concrete with a fine grain containing mica in order to achieve an appearance reminiscent of the anthracite coal mined at Zollverein from 1847 to 1986.

Effective colour-matched protection

In addition to Ortolan, the architectural team also opted for Emcoril Protect M Lite from MC for curing the cleanable coating and for all other in-situ concrete measures in the floor, wall and ceiling areas. As a protection against evaporation, it ensures a good barrier effect, facilitates optimum hydration progress in the near-surface concrete layer and minimises the formation of early shrinkage cracks. In order to meet the planners’ demands for exceptionally high surface quality, some areas were also repaired and colour-matched with the concrete cosmetics of MC’s Emcefix product system.

 

And with very good results: The huge, almost floating landscape roof was opened in spring 2019 after 15 months of construction and is another real eye-catcher on the former coking site, a location that already has more than its fair share of amazing visual attractions.