Inspired by a successful project carried out ten years ago (!) in Netherlands, on the Eindhoven University of Technology, the first UK virtual construction training center is set to open in Coventry in September 2009.

The ACT-UK Simulation Centre will enable construction managers to practice their people management skills and help them develop their potential. This will be done through a pioneering combination of virtual reality computer techniques and participation of real people.

On a 12-meter panoramic screen, the training facility will reproduce construction sites in detail, allowing the trainees to have a rich immersive experience based on real-life situations. The particularity of the concept is in that these situations will also involve professional actors, playing site personnel, colleagues, or members of the public. While "walking" through the construction site, the future managers will have to face laying off members of the stuff, conflicts with angry residents or subcontractors threatening to walk off the job. The realism of the scene is supposed to help them build mechanisms against all kinds of pressure they will be exposed to once in the real world.

Backed by the Chartered Institute of Building (CIOB) and leading construction companies, including Balfour Beatty, the project aims at having the success of it's Netherlands predecessor. The BMSC (Building Management Simulation Centre) at Leeuwarden has transformed the approach to training in this challenging sector, and is today used by more than 360 firms.

[ via 24dash.com ]