Student housing in Milan

Building use

Other

Country/Region

Italy

Overview

The building is a new student housing for the students of the Milano Bicocca university. It is designed to offer 440 beds for students spread across 15 floors. The building lateral support is provided by 4 concrete cores, coupled 2 by 2. The frame is provided by steel columns and composite beams, with a slim floor technology.

Basic information (construction date, number of stories, gross floor area, adopted design code, engineer(s), Contractor(s), etc.)

Construction date: 2016-2019
Number of stories: 15+2 below ground
Gross floor area: 12,000m2
Adopted design code: Eurocode
Engineer(s): Arching srl – Ing. Alessandro Rossi + Steel Project Italia srl – Ing. Giovanni Costa
Contractor(s): Stahlbau Pichler Srl

Issue and/or innovation

The shear studs of the composite floor beams are welded on both sides of the steel beam web rather than on the flanges, thus leading to a decreased thickness of the concrete layer that needs to be poured on top of the pre-fab hollow core concrete slabs.

Reason for composite solution

The building is developed by a real estate investor and the cost component was particularly important as well as the duration of the construction works. It was thus decided to build the frame using steel columns, to favor speed, and the floor slabs using a composite slim floor solution to keep the floor thickness to a minimum to save on the total height of the building and on the cost of facades.

Specific solution/technical details

Floors are realized with the slim floor technology. The main horizontal support is provided by a welded asymmetric double T beam, offering the wider flange on the bottom to provide support to pre-compressed hollow core concrete slabs. The height of each slab module is 16cm, topped by a 5 cm cast in place concrete layer with a welded wire mesh. The composite action is provided in this case by shear studs welded on both sides of the steel beam web rather than on the top flange. Where the slabs meet the concrete core, they are supported by a L shaped steel profile anchored to the core walls.