HOOVER MECHANICAL MEETS A TALL ORDER FROM COVE PROPERTIES
B ehind every condo tower there is a team of builders, mechanics and other tradespeople who partner with the developer to make sure that, by the time the first residents move in, the taps work and the heat comes on when it’s chilly.
Cove Properties’ quartet of high-rise residences south of downtown — Nuera, Sasso, Vetro and Alura — transformed Calgary’s skyline. And Hoover Mechanical Plumbing & Heating Ltd. was there every step of the way to make sure the infrastructure was in place to ensure resident comfort and security.
“On the four towers, we put in just over 186,000 man hours (working on) just over 1,000 suites,” says Hoover Mechanical president Rob Purcell, who joined the company in 2000 and, with business partner Rod Sjolie, took over Hoover in 2010.
“We’ve always been involved in things like multi-family apartments. Four-storey wood structures and concrete high-rises are the majority of our business, and we have also done office buildings and recreation centres.”
Some of Hoover’s other notable projects have included Genesis Centre of Health & Wellness, the new Ernest Manning High School, and even renovations at the Okotoks Wal-Mart.
But there’s always something special about building new homes, and Hoover has part- nered with Cove on a number of its projects.
“We started out doing some of their smaller apartment buildings in the early 2000s, and we’ve been building all of their mechanical systems ever since,” says Purcell. “What Cove does really well is they form partnerships with the trade teams and then the quality stays top-notch. Everyone knows what they getting from each other, everything runs smoother.”
Purcell says much of the work done by Hoover Mechanical’s 350 employees “is hidden behind the scenes. It’s in the mechanical room, hidden inside the walls. Where we take a lot of pride is in the efficiency of the system and how we work with the minimum amount of bugs or deficiencies to work out … running smooth for a long duration.”
When asked what challenges his company faced in providing heating and plumbing for more than 1,000 inner-city high-rise condo units, Purcell says it was the scope of the project.
“Definitely the scale, for sure; the size of the equipment and the piping’s a lot bigger,” he says, adding there are also different standards for the types of materials that can be used in a 34-storey tower like Vetro versus a smaller-scale four-storey development.
“There are booster systems needed to get water to the upper floors of the building, also chilled and heating distribution systems, boiler plants, forced-air systems including extensive duct work, and natural gas distri- bution ... co-ordination is very important,” Purcell says.
“Our partnership with Cove Properties is a very important part of our business and we are extremely proud to be part of the product Cove Properties is producing,” he adds.
With the four towers now completed, Hoover Mechanical continues its partnership with Cove Properties by providing plumbing and heating installation for some of Cove’s newest developments, such as The Pinnacle at Kincora and The Armory in Currie Barracks.
For Cove, having reliable trades and construction partners is vital to ensuring the construction of homes that people don’t just want to buy, but they actually want to live in. Working with companies such as Hoover Mechanical, whether on towers or low-rises, helps Cove live up to the high standards of its buyers and investors.
““We’ve never looked at Hoover as one of our subtrades but rather one of our partners, we both know what the expectation is in regards to quality and delivery and Hoover has never failed us in the 13 years we’ve been working together,” says Doug Mazurek, Cove Properties president, southern Alberta.
For more information about Hoover Mechanical, visit hoovermechanical.com or call 403-217-5655. For information on the latest developments by Cove Properties, visit coveproperties.ca.