Logistics warehouses — span buys the floor, the truck buys the building
Span, and what it does not buy
Span gives clear floor between columns, which is what a racking layout or a long goods flow needs. It does not give floor flatness, and floor flatness is what most warehouses are actually judged on — a very narrow-aisle truck will not run on a slab that was poured to a workshop tolerance.
The slab decision is made before the frame is detailed. Getting the frame right and the slab wrong is a common and expensive order: the frame is a drawing change, the slab is a demolition.
Cross dock and end load
A cross-dock terminal is decided by door pairs and apron depth, not by the building area. The number of doors on each long side, the apron depth in front of them and the trailer turning circle together produce a footprint, and the span is then chosen to fit it.
An end-load warehouse is cheaper because it needs one apron instead of two, and the trade-off is internal travel distance. Neither is wrong; they are two different operations and the building should say which one it is.
Raised dock or level entry
A raised dock needs the ramp, the retaining wall and the waterproofing at the ramp head, and those three are civil works with a structural edge. Level entry needs a longer apron and a flatter approach.
The choice is usually made by what the site looks like from the road. A site with a fall across it will push the decision one way no matter what the operation wanted.
The special cases
A container freight station carries customs: an area that can be closed, a floor that can take a laden handler, and a layout that lets an inspection happen without stopping the whole shed.
A port transit warehouse is set by dwell time, not by storage volume. A weighbridge needs its own small building and a queue canopy, because the queue is the part that decides the layout.
A mezzanine inside a warehouse is a second floor with a second set of loads laid onto a frame designed for a roof. It is a design change, not a fit-out.
Delivered record
B5 is a 40 m span × 50 m length logistics warehouse at 40 m × 50 m, 6 m bay spacing, 2,000 m², delivered in Burkina Faso, with no overhead crane. It sits alongside four other buildings totalling 19,800 m². Floor areas, spans and bay spacing for all five.
Numbers behind this page
Production base 125,000 m² across six workshops; overhead cranes four at 150 t each in the West Zone from 2026; factory established 2000, current company name since 2014, exporting since 2004; quality management ISO 9001 — certificate 19822QA0131R1S, valid to January 2028. Certificate and inspection records.
Delivered spans so far 30 m to 100 m at 6 m or 7 m bay spacing, five buildings totalling 19,800 m² in Brazil and Burkina Faso. The full record, in numbers.
Notes on this sector
- Cross-dock terminal: doors and apron before area
- Raised dock or level entry
- Container freight station: customs drives the layout
- Port transit warehouse and dwell time
- Mezzanine inside a warehouse
- Weighbridge house and queue canopy
Next step
Send the process inside the building and the loads it has to carry — span, length, eave height, crane duty or none, and the roof and wall spec you are working to. Sizing comes back as a drawing question, not a price. Send a project description.
Company · Hebei Hongji Shunda Steel Structure Engineering Co., Ltd. — a Chinese manufacturer of prefabricated steel buildings, building since 2000, working from a 125,000 m² production base with six production workshops and four 150 t overhead cranes, operating an ISO 9001 quality management system.
Reading · All industries · Notes on sizing and detailing · Reference