Jaipur Exhibition & Convention Center

The Jaipur Exhibition & Convention Center (JECC) at Jaipur consists of 2 exhibition halls, multipurpose halls, food court, and cafeteria. It has a total covering area of 4 lac sq. ft. The entire project is in structural steel, as the concept of exhibition halls is based on functional flexibility and aesthetics. The clear span of exhibition hall is 65m while the overall length of exhibition hall is 160m with clear height of 18m. The concept of exhibition halls is such that it can be used as a single exhibition hall in case of international large scale exhibitions with single column free space of 2.5 lac sq. ft. At the same time, it’s planning is such that it can handle 6 nos. of small scale exhibitions with a provision of roof hung central partitions.

The Plan
Being a project of PPP nature, JECC is one of the most prestigious project of M A Architects with a humongous volume and a very elaborate design brief – which was to develop 2 large exhibition halls and convention centre, in addition to development of 42 acres of malls, hotels and other commercial activities, entertainment facilities and kid’s zone to silent conference zones, art exhibition halls and auditoriums posed a big challenge of managing circulation and zoning to maintain a proportion of interaction channels and isolation screens with the understanding of flexibility of space and time of use, hence, bridging every aspect with a barrier free design catering to every need of all kind of users from every age group.

The project houses a combined 2.5 lac sq. ft. in exhibition and convention areas with retractable seating column free spans, exceeding over 200 ft. making it an engineering marvel and an architectural treat for the city.

Structural Aspects
The noticeable structural aspects of this exhibition center are as follows:

• Truss type is open web curved roof truss, curvature of truss at both top and bottom chord.
• Clear span of the truss is 65m
• C/C span of the truss is 10m
• End support is steel columns
• Ridge height is 20m
• Eaves height is 15m
• Overall length of exhibition hall 160m
• C/C span of purlin 1.5m

Challenges/Complexities Faced
There were quite a complexities involved in the making of project. The covering span of 65m was arched/curved shape from the top and bottom chord. The end supports needed to be single support instead of latticed columns, which required to be designed with large amount of forces laterally. The joints and connections had to be designed architecturally as it would be exposed internally. The eaves end had to be architecturally finished wherein the real time complexities were to hide end drainage gutters, maintenance systems, cat walks etc.

The total facade had to be free standing on 20m brick-work with stone cladding to be integrated/merged with the main structural steel supports. The main columns were to be designed for support on one side with all services including AC, chillers etc. and another side support was to be designed for cantilever canopies to cover large entrance area without any intermediate columns or supports. As this project was extremely time-bound, with most economical design concept with maximum aesthetic architecturally, it was also a challenge as far as structural engineering was considered. All primary members were open web arch/curved roof trusses span 65m at 10mm center to center of supports, whereas the secondary system is interconnected purlins and bottom tie chords.

Salient Features
The exhibition center has a 65m clear span open web curved roof trusses – with end supports structurally as sleek as possible. The end supports were designed with loads of all service platforms internal as well as external with large covering canopies externally. All these had to be achieved in extremely tight budgeted cost and time constraints. The roof trusses were to be designed in such a way so as to divide 160m span into three separate exhibitions halls covering 50m each.

Also it was important in the concept that once three separate halls were divided with curtain walls, it should be such that there should be no sound transfer when all three halls were functional at the same time. Also, when large exhibitions would be held, no intermediate supports should be visible throughout the 160m span. For covering such a large span roofing system, structural steel is the ideal solution, and cannot be executed in concrete. All structural steel sections used were hollow sections/tubes.

For structural engineers, it was to achieve a milestone in the project category which is high in architectural aesthetics, high in safety, extremely tight in budgeted cost, and high in completion time, with unconventional large spans to cover for functional and planning use of the structure, extremely precise systems for erect ion and fabrications. It does require past experiences to control all above mentioned salient points of the complex structural systems. It took one year to execute the two exhibition halls of 65m x 160m long.

Steel Selection
Once the master plan was chalked out, the major hurdle was to construct the exhibition hall within a short time frame. Steel being a factory fabricated material and having flexibility to work on RCC at site simultaneously saves time. Large span of 62m wide achieving in any other material is very difficult or nearly impossible. Steel frames provides immense flexibility to run all services and cat walks through open spaces. Single hall large span buildings which are expansion joint less, best suited for steel structure.

Essential Facilities

• Two Indoor Exhibition Halls of minimum 10,000 sq. mtrs. each
• One Outdoor Exhibition Space of minimum 10,000 sq. mtr.
• Multi-Purpose Convention Hall with modular retractable seating arrangement for a minimum of 1000 delegates
• Two Meeting Halls of 50 and 30 pax. capacity each
• Two Board Rooms with 30 pax. capacity each
• Two VVIP Lounges with 30 pax. capacity each
• Administrative and Office Space
• Food and Beverages Facilities
• Provision of car parking to be made as per RIICO / Local Building Bye-Laws
• Other common and support facilities such as internal roads, street lights, water harvesting system, solid waste disposal, main sewer line, water supply including storage tank(s), transformer, electrical sub-station, green patches etc.

It is with great pride that we would like to inform you that ‘Jaipur Exhibition cum Convention Center’ (JECC) is the largest purpose built state-of-the-art convention facility not only in India, but, also South Asia for that matter. Also importantly, there are features which are unique to us and which segregate us from the rest. At the outset we have two indoor exhibition halls of 10,000 sq. mtrs. each; both of which are column less and have a clear height of 13m or 40 feet, and more so, both the halls are air-conditioned. We have a total exhibition area rounding to 40,000 sq. mtrs. at one single space and a 250-rooms business hotel all at one venue along with Food & Beverage facilities. We think JECC, in short span of time, will be not only the talk of town of Jaipur city, but, will also create a different and unique space in the Indian Exhibition & Convention Industry and be the face of our country in the times to come
ARIF KHAN, Project Head & Chief Engineer, Dangayach Group

Once the master plan was chalked out, the major hurdle was to construct the exhibition hall within short time frame. Steel being a factory fabricated material and having flexibility to work on RCC at site, simultaneously saves time. Large span of 62m wide achieving in any other material is very difficult or nearly impossible. Steel frames provides immense flexibility to run all services and cat walks through open spaces. Single hall large span buildings which are expansion joint less, are best suited for steel structure
SHARAD MAITHEL, Principal, M A Architects

The overall experience as structural engineer was to achieve a milestone in the project category which is high in architectural aesthetics, high in safety, extremely tight in budgeted cost, and high in completion time, with unconventional large spans to cover for functional and planning use of the structure, extremely precise systems for erect ion and fabrications. As structural engineer, it requires past experiences to control such complex structural systems
VIVEK GARG, Director, Global Engineering Services