Secure building construction
A building’s security is decided on the drawings, not at handover.
- Parent division
- Secure buildings
The problem
What is added after acceptance costs several times its original price and never reaches the same result.
A secure building is hard to tell from an ordinary one in a photograph. What sets it apart is a set of decisions taken early: where the line between public and internal runs, which walls separate what, which technical rooms are reachable from which circulation, and where the cables run.
Those decisions belong to the drawings. Once the building is handed over, they can only be recovered through expensive rework: walls cut, surface-mounted routes, doors replaced, rooms relocated. The result stays below what integrated design would have produced.
The organisational difficulty is that security, low-voltage systems, power and the second fix are usually held by different contractors. Each is compliant with its own package, and nobody answers for the interface between packages. That is where most programmes come apart.
Where a building’s security is decided, schematic
- 01Brief and zoning
- The line between public and internal, circulation and control points. Before the drawings.
- 02Drawings
- Cable routes sized, technical rooms placed, builder’s work openings provided. Afterwards, everything is recovered by cutting walls.
- 03Second fix
- Joinery, doors and ironmongery, real separation between zones, singular points.
- 04Systems
- Access control, detection, video and intercom designed as one, with a shared incident log.
- 05Interface accountability
- A single party named in the contract. Without it, every package is compliant and the whole does not work.
- 06Acceptance at the interfaces
- The interfaces are tested, not each package in isolation. That is where the defects sit.
Scope
What the service covers
- Brief and zoning
- Division into security zones, separate circulation for public, staff and deliveries, position of control points, and escape routes compatible with access control.
- Envelope and second fix
- Façades, joinery, doors and their ironmongery, real separation between zones, and treatment of singular points and technical accesses.
- Low-voltage systems
- Cable routes sized at design stage, distributed technical rooms, builder’s work openings, cabling, and connection of security, network and telephony systems.
- Power
- Backed-up boards and circuits, routes separated from power and low-voltage cabling, generator room, UPS room, ventilation and containment.
- Security systems
- Access control, intrusion detection, video surveillance, intercom and guard post designed as one, with a shared incident log.
- Acceptance and operation
- Coordinated acceptance across packages, interface testing, as-built records handed over in a usable format, and training for the operating team.
Situations
The most frequent situations
- Public-facing administrative building
- Public and staff sharing one building, entry control that does not create a queue, and technical areas unreachable from public circulation.
- Diplomatic mission or representation
- Zones under distinct regimes, vehicle access treatment, guard post, and the interface between security systems and lockdown procedures.
- Technical site or operations centre
- Technical rooms dominate, power and cooling drive the design, access is restricted and traced, and cable routes carry heavy constraints.
- Refurbishment of an existing building
- Structural constraints are fixed. The work is establishing what can be achieved, at what cost, and what will not be.
Requirements
What to require, of us as of anyone
These requirements hold whichever supplier is appointed. Written into a tender, they filter out the responses that will not hold.
- A zoning plan settled before construction drawings, approved by those who will operate the building.
- Low-voltage cable routes sized at design stage, with spare capacity for future change.
- Compatibility between access control and emergency exits, verified with the regulatory inspection body.
- A single party accountable for interfaces between packages, named in the contract rather than at the first snag.
- Acceptance that tests the interfaces, and not each package in isolation.
- As-built records in a usable format, including cabling diagrams and system configurations.
- Training for the operating team before go-live, rather than after the first incident.
Pitfalls
Common mistakes, and what they cost
- Treating security as an added package
- Brought in after the design, it comes down to fixing equipment onto an architecture that does not serve it. The result is a building that is equipped but not secure.
- Undersizing cable routes
- Trays are calculated to the minimum and are full at handover. Any later change becomes surface-mounted, therefore more vulnerable and less acceptable.
- Accepting package by package
- Every contractor is compliant and the whole does not work. Interface defects surface in operation, once the contractors have left.
- Forgetting how the building will be run
- A secure building presupposes procedures, permissions and a trained team. Handed over without them, it works for a few weeks, then doors are left open for convenience.
Questions
Questions asked before consulting
When should security be brought into a construction project?
At the brief, before the drawings. Zoning, circulation, the position of technical rooms and cable routes are drawing decisions. Brought in at construction stage, security can only add equipment; brought in at the brief, it changes how the building is organised for a small additional cost.
How are access control and evacuation reconciled?
By treating both together, door by door. No security device may prevent an evacuation; emergency exits release on alarm and carry a manual release. The arrangement is verified with the regulatory inspection body and documented, because the inspection body will re-examine it at every visit.
Is a guard post necessary?
It is justified as soon as decisions must be taken in real time: granting an access, qualifying an alarm, calling assistance. Its design turns on sightlines from the post, screen ergonomics, the incident log and the continuity of its power. A post that is equipped but uncomfortable is deserted within months.
What if packages are awarded separately?
Responsibility for the interfaces must be assigned explicitly to someone. Without that, every contractor is compliant with its own contract and nobody answers for how the whole performs. It is the most frequent cause of delayed acceptance, and it is prevented in the contract, not on site.
Can an existing building be secured?
Always in part, rarely completely. A survey establishes what the structure and circulation allow, at what cost, and what will stay out of reach. That gap is documented: it is better to operate a building whose limits are known than one believed to be secure.
What should the handover file contain?
As-built drawings, power and low-voltage cabling diagrams, labelling of routes and technical rooms, security system configurations and their backups, interface test records, and operating procedures. A file handed over in a non-editable format forces a full re-survey at the first change.
Neighbouring subjects
Solutions concerned
Consultations · Pre-qualifications · Partnerships
Let us discuss the actual case.
Describe the site, the dominant constraint and the deadline. We will say what requires a preliminary study and what can be committed directly.