The Gran Almenning forestry business in the Norwegian province of Oppland, around one hour‘s drive north of Oslo, comprises 180,000 hectares of forest. As the building contractor of the new Almenningtråkket commercial complex, therefore, it goes without saying that the company used wood as the main construction material. The municipality of Gran is now home to one of Norway‘s largest timber-built sales and commercial centres. This important reference project for timber construction in Norway was completed in 2014 and won an award for ‚Wooden Structure of the Year‘ that same year.
A timber-built commercial centreGran Almenning invested around NOK 98 million (EUR 10.5 million) in the project, which was supported with public funding. The project was designed by the architects BAS and realised by the construction company AS Miljøbygg, a company in the BackeGruppen Group, under the terms of a general contractor agreement. The initial plans had been drawn up by 2011, and construction began in 2013. The building has been fully operational since 2015. The main tenants are a discount store, a furniture store and the builders‘ merchant Maxbo, which building contractor Gran Almenning has been supplying with timber building materials for many years.
Almenningtråkket comprises three large, interconnected buildings with total floor space of 9,500 m2 , some of which is on two storeys. Depending on the tenant, the space is used as storage space, sales floor or offices. All the buildings are wooden with a single pitch roof or shed roof. The main structure of the buildings consists of wooden supports, cross beams and pillars that are glued in layers. The wooden structure spans up to 23 metres. The structure is visible and highlights the sturdy, natural wooden construction method used.
