Kier has been secured a £48 million contract to add 18,000 m2 of office space and two multi-storey car parks on the ARM campus at Peterhouse Technology Park in Fulbourn. The scheme will be ready for occupation next autumn and will allow ARM to increase its Cambridge headcount to 3,000 and double its headcount in the UK during the next five years. Softbank will fully support the expansion, whose takeover offer ARM has recommended shareholders to accept. A steel frame and curtain walling with bespoke vertical aluminium Brise Soleil solar shading will be used to construct the new office building, which will form a six metre tall high saw tooth pattern. Mark Dady, Kier Construction Eastern Managing Director, commented: “We’re pleased to have been awarded the contract to develop ARM’s global headquarters. We have a strong track record in delivering office space across the UK and are looking forward to providing a facility that will help ARM to continue expanding.” Dady added that the development will boost the local economy and employment opportunities. Mike Muller, chief technology officer and co-founder of ARM, said: “We are making a significant investment at our headquarters in Cambridge to help us deliver the next phase of company growth and Kier is a valuable partner in delivering our new centrepiece building.” At present, Kier is also constructing a £79 million laboratory for the University of Cambridge on the Cambridge Biomedical Campus. Earlier in the month, Kier secured three major construction frameworks worth £5 billion between them. The latest in the framework haul is a place on the two-year £500m University of Cambridge Framework to provide a range of facilities including laboratories, teaching and lecture spaces and sport facilities. Balfour Beatty, Bam Construct, Bouygues and Laing O’Rourke have also won places on the panel for projects worth more than £30m.

Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children has started the search for a team to deliver phase four of its redevelopment master plan. Although the famous hospital is yet to complete the second phase of its redevelopment scheme, it has already started planning the £190 million phase four. In the EU Official Journal, the hospital trust has published a contract notice for a multidisciplinary design team with prime contractor for the fourth phase of its campus redevelopment programme. This will be a new circa 23 000 m2 building “to present a less institutional facade to visitors”. The contract notice states: “The Trust wishes to appoint a multi-disciplinary design team with prime contractor familiar with working on complex projects with complicated institutions and other key stakeholders, and which assembles a multi-disciplinary team capable of generating an outstanding vision for the phase four redevelopment and seeing that vision through to construction and completion on site.” Due to the legal and technical complexity of the scheme, the trust will use the competitive dialogue procedure. Any submissions of interest or requests to participate must be in by October 7, 2016. Phase 2B, the Premier Inn Clinical Building within the Mittal Children’s Medical Centre, is set to be completed by Skanska next year. Phase 3 will also be constructed by the same contractor; the £65m Zayed Centre for Research into Rare Disease in Children, which is set to be finished in 2018. It is anticipated that the fourth phase of the scheme will be finished in 2022. The procurement documents for Phase 4 are available at: https://ribacompetitions.wufoo.eu/forms/gosh-phase-4. Meanwhile, former Skanska boss and veteran of the construction industry, David Blackburn, has been appointed managing director of Momentum Infrastructure, a joint venture comprising Dragados, Galliford Try and Hochtief. Momentum Infrastructure was created last year to bid for the HS2 rail project, which will run between London, the Midlands, Manchester and Yorkshire.

The latest published index figures show that the annual rate of house growth in key UK cities is beginning to slow down after a year of successive price rises. However, there is evidence of variation between regions with house prices in major regional cities outside of the south of England showing continued growth, while those in the capital have seen a slowdown in the market, according to the Hometrack cities index. House price growth outside of the south has remained steady with a 7% to 8% per year, with no indication of a slowdown to come. There has also been a slower rate of price falls in Aberdeen in comparison with recent months with an 8% decline compared to the previous month’s figure of 10%. City house prices increased by 9.5% overall year on year in July, which was a decrease from 9.9% in June, with the strongest growth rate seen in Bristol in the south west which was 14%, closely followed by London at 11.7%. While quarter on quarter the highest growth was in lower value, higher yielding cities where prices are rising off a lower base such as Glasgow, up 5.2%, Liverpool up 4.4% and Manchester and Nottingham both up 3.4%. Despite having the second largest yearly price growth, London has registered a marked slowdown in house price growth over the last three months. Average growth in the last quarter was 2.1%, the lowest rate for almost a year and a half. The report states: “We continue to believe that turnover will register the brunt of the slowdown in London. In the face of lower sales volumes agents will look to re-price stock in line with what buyers are prepared, and can afford, to pay. “Past experience shows that this process can run for as long as six months and relies, in part, in how quickly sellers are willing to adjust to what buyers are prepared to pay.”

Planning applications have been put forward for the construction of a £150 million residential towers development in Salford. The proposed ‘City View’ development will be made up of four towers ranging from eight to 24 storeys. Included in the towers would be 37 town houses and 488 apartments with commercial, retail and amenity space. If accepted, the towers would be built at the junction of the A57 Regent Road and Oldfield Road, which links Manchester with Salford. Local architect Fletcher Rae has put forward the designs on behalf of Vivere Group, the residential branch of Bilt Group. The parties involved are hoping to start construction of the towers in spring 2018. Joint Managing Director at Fletcher Rae, Andrew Rae, commented: “The form of the building responds directly to the vision of the site to create a viable and sustainable regeneration development in a strategic location on Regents Road. The development will link to existing community infrastructure and adjacent developments. “This proposal is intended to repair the severed link that exists between these communities and developments and create a much-needed activity node for movement between these key places in the city.” Meanwhile, last month plans for a huge £33m tower block which will house almost 200 plush flats in Salford were approved. The luxury X1 The Gateway close to Salford Quays will see 191 one, two and three-bedroom apartments built by early 2018. The impressive development will feature a gym on site, car parking, secure bicycle storage, a management office in the foyer and shops on the ground floor. Some apartments will also have large roof terraces and the double-height ground floor will boast floor-to-ceiling windows. Council chiefs in Salford approved Knight Knox and X1 Developments’ application for the buy-to-let apartment scheme on Trafford Road at the town hall’s latest planning meeting.