Tallinn’s Vabaduse väljak is open for cityfolks

On August 19 2009 AS Oma Ehitaja handed over Vabaduse väljak and the underground parking lot to the City of Tallinn. At sunset on Independence Day mayor of Tallinn Edgar Savisaar pronounced the square officially opened. During the last year (construction work began on August 2008) the construction process passed smoothly through different development stages. The starting period was characterized by large-scale archeological researches and excavations, lasting altogether 8 months. The archeological researches were carried out on an area of 5000 m², including Medieval coatings and 2000m² of Mesolithic coatings. At the same time the parking lot indent excavation took place (altogether 60000 m³ of soil was moved) and the building of the support structures for the underground parking lot. The largest amount of work was constructing the parking lot’s concrete structures. Close to 9000 m³ of concrete was poured, 8 500 tons of reinforced steel was installed and 47 km of residual stress cables were placed. During the last 4 months the design and construction of offices under the square took place. Medieval town walls have also been preserved and exposed in the parking lot. During the building work in the last year Oma Ehitaja engaged close to 40 subcontractors and roughly 100 workers every day. The completed working site building area is 10400 m², which includes 5700 m² of the parking lot and 1300 m² of rentable offices. Under the square there are parking spaces for 123 cars, Ahhaa science centre, youth centre, introductional exhibition about the square’s history, cafe, toilets and support point for municipal police. For the builders, this was a construction process that required a multitude of skills and a very good know-how of project management, which Oma Ehitaja completed successfully by fulfilling its contracted duties on time and accurately.