The Hawthorn Football Club Kennedy Community Centre is one of the most significant sporting precincts in Australia.
Spanning 28 hectares in Dingley, the Kennedy Community Centre features equal elite facilities for our AFL and AFLW programs, whilst serving as a home for the entire Hawthorn family, including past players, members, fans and the wider community.
The world-class, state-of-the-art complex is headlined by the Harris High Performance Centre, featuring an elite gymnasium with full aquatic facilities, including a magnesium pool and dry sauna, as well as equal amenities and locker rooms for both AFL and AFLW programs.
Adjacent to the MCG-sized training oval is the dedicated AFLW Oval and Community Pavillion, boasting full broadcast facilities, changerooms and floodlights – which has been purpose-built to host future AFLW matches, in addition to being available to the local community.
Cost and program leadership in a dynamic market
Hawthorn Football Club engaged WT in 2016 to provide comprehensive cost management and quantity surveying services for the Kennedy Community Centre, including cost planning, procurement advice, and construction phase cost control. We also delivered portfolio and program advisory support, undertaking a detailed programme and status review to assist in clarifying timelines, sequencing, and risk across the delivery phases.
When market volatility resulted in an unfavourable tender outcome, we worked closely with the contractor and client team to identify and implement practical cost-saving solutions. This included separating the civil and building works into distinct packages to reduce preliminaries and margins, enabling early procurement of materials, proposing suitable alternatives, and recommending structural changes such as reducing steel member sizes and modifying the pool design to avoid piling.
Under tight timeframes, our collaborative and proactive approach was instrumental in testing and executing value management strategies that retained the project’s intent while achieving critical savings. These efforts helped realign the project budget and program, ensuring delivery remained viable and on track.
The Kennedy Community Centre was completed in November 2025 and has set the national benchmark for elite and community sporting integration.
We’re proud that our work on this project has been shortlisted for the Excellence in Cost and Commercial Management award in the 2026 AIQS Built Environment Awards.
