York based housebuilder Persimmon Homes has secured planning permission for its latest residential project in Wigan. This week, the planning committee at Wigan Council gave the green light for Persimmon to create 150 new homes on land East of Pocket Nook Farm in Lowton. Around a quarter of the properties
Balfour Beatty has announced that its managing director for the north of Scotland is retiring after a 40 year career in the industry. Aberdeen-based George Hood recently oversaw the completion of the £22.3 million Third Don Crossing for the giant construction and civil engineering firm. The major project marked one of the last
Steel firm SCH Site Services is helping major logistics company Stiller to expand once more with the development of a £750,000 warehouse. Based on Aycliffe Business Park, Stiller Warehousing and Distribution is in the process of building a new 40,000 sq ft warehouse for its rapidly expanding list of customers.
Technical and non-technical workplace safety and performance consultancy, People Factor Consultants (PFC) is celebrating a record six months after recording major rises in the number of people taking its electrical safety and human factors courses. The consultancy firm offers a number of highly interactive electrical safety courses accredited by City
Manchester’s Piccadilly Gardens are set to receive a £10 million facelift as plans have been unveiled for a multi-million pound regeneration. Legal & General Investment Management Real Assets (L&G) will give the city centre space an overhaul as part of a £10 million investment, in conjunction with Manchester City Council.
Construction and infrastructure firm Morgan Sindall has reached a major milestone in its work on a £15.4 million special educational needs school in Essex. Glenwood School is being built for Essex County Council and will offer support for 210 children and young adults who have severe, and multiple, learning difficulties.
York based housebuilder Persimmon Homes has secured planning permission for its latest residential project in Wigan. This week, the planning committee at Wigan Council gave the green light for Persimmon to create 150 new homes on land East of Pocket Nook Farm in Lowton. Around a quarter of the properties will be affordable housing for either sale or rent. Part of the development will see Persimmon create an open public space that will feature a play area, informal parks, wetlands and ponds. The firm will also make a contribution towards a road marking scheme and the maintenance of play areas and parks. Wigan Council’s deputy leader and cabinet member for regeneration, Cllr David Molyneux, said the scheme’s approval is “brilliant news for the borough”. He commented: “It can take time to get to this stage and to get things really moving forward so this is a great step for our economy. “It is vital that we support appropriate housing development in the borough to keep up with demand for housing and help support growth in our local economy.“ Speaking further, Cllr Molyneux said it is important to keep building affordable homes “so a range of people are attracted to our borough and can find the right home for them”. He added: “Good quality new housing along with improved transport links and employment opportunities provides the right mix to keep our local economy growing.” Outline planning permission for the development was granted in January this year. Persimmon Homes has worked to boost its presence in the North West with a number of residential projects over the last two years. In September last year, the firm signed a £7.25 million deal to acquire 25.8 acres of land in Newton-le-Willows, Merseyside, from asset management company Gresham House.
Balfour Beatty has announced that its managing director for the north of Scotland is retiring after a 40 year career in the industry. Aberdeen-based George Hood recently oversaw the completion of the £22.3 million Third Don Crossing for the giant construction and civil engineering firm. The major project marked one of the last chapters of a career that started for Mr Hood as a 19-year old trainee quantity surveyor in 1975 with the firm Alexander Hall, which would later become Hall & Tawse. This was eventually be bought by the Scottish construction firm, Mansell, a part of Balfour Beatty since 2003. When he started out Mr Hood took home a salary of £1,301 from an industry that was “booming” in the north east of the country, even before the discovery of oil in the North Sea. He said: “We were putting up lots of multi-storey flats for the council” and the sector was also meeting the needs of a whisky industry that demanded the building of bonded warehouses. But it was with the oil boom of the 1980s a construction frenzy began. “All of a sudden Aberdeen was flooded with Yanks – high rollers”, said Mr Hood. “We were busy busy, building all the sort of stuff you would get in a frontier-style town.” Office blocks and hotels went up for the oil industry executives and workers, followed by a boom in pubs, nightclubs and restaurants. Within eight years of starting in the industry, Mr Hood was project surveyor on a number of large Aberdeen office developments that would transform the city, including at the Hill of Rubislaw for ConocoPhilips, Marathon Oil and Britoil. He would later also project manage the Bon Accord shopping centre and oversaw the demolition of George Street. One of the ironies of his career was building a hospitality suite at Ibrox Stadium, despite being a life-long Celtic fan.
Steel firm SCH Site Services is helping major logistics company Stiller to expand once more with the development of a £750,000 warehouse. Based on Aycliffe Business Park, Stiller Warehousing and Distribution is in the process of building a new 40,000 sq ft warehouse for its rapidly expanding list of customers. The latest development will stand at 10 metres tall and will have the capacity to store a further 6,000 pallets for the family run business. The scheme will support dozens of local jobs during its construction. Darlington bases ADG Architects will manage the project with civil engineering support from Durham based firm BDN. Hall Construction is its main contractor, based nearby at Rushyford, which awarded Aycliffe based SCH a project to fabricate and erect its frame using 90 tonnes of steel. CH, which has previously worked with Hall Construction on the refurbishment of buildings at PD Ports on Teesside, completed the steel fabrication and erection of the frame within eight weeks, and the warehouse is expected to be fully completed in the New Year. SCH managing director Gary Finley said: “We’re delighted to have worked on a project so close to us in Newton Aycliffe which is supporting several local employers. “We fabricated the steel in-house at our facility just around the corner from Stiller’s site and erected it on site. “The extension had to join an existing warehouse which made it a little more complex than a stand- alone shed and we also had to design the end connections for the structure, but we’re pleased we’ve been able to work with one of our neighbours in enabling their ambitious plans for future growth.” The new warehouse will take Stiller’s recent investments in equipment, people and property to more than £6.4 million in the last three years.
Technical and non-technical workplace safety and performance consultancy, People Factor Consultants (PFC) is celebrating a record six months after recording major rises in the number of people taking its electrical safety and human factors courses. The consultancy firm offers a number of highly interactive electrical safety courses accredited by City & Guilds as well as its range of non-technical, human factors training. Earlier in the year, the firm launched its newest course, HV Systems Operations. This course combines eight days worth of training into one five day course and provides operators with what it describes as a ‘flexible, cost effective option’ for electrical safety training. Brian Crichton, Technical Director at PFC, commented on the company’s success: “Our portfolio of courses is extremely flexible and we have ensured that all courses are developed to meet the current needs of the industry for cost-effective training solutions. Even during the toughest times, operators have still acknowledged that we need to avoid complacency with workplace safety and that investment at this time will pay off in terms of safety and performance. “Between this year and last we’ve doubled the number of Responsible Electrical Person courses delivered, and numbers for our Electrical Safety and Situation Awareness have increased fivefold over the same period last year. Our HV Switching course, which is now incorporated into our HV Systems Operations course, has proved extremely popular with delegates. We’ve had a significant amount of excellent feedback, with one delegate sharing that he has never undertaken such effective training during his 30 years in the industry. “The success of our training courses is testament to our experienced team of specialist trainers and is a reflection of our flexibility in developing the most effective courses which offer delegates a comprehensive understanding of electrical safety.” PFC offers a portfolio of 15 technical and non-technical training courses. Many of these are accredited by City & Guild, as well as providing tailored training and consultancy services to high hazard industries across the world.
Manchester’s Piccadilly Gardens are set to receive a £10 million facelift as plans have been unveiled for a multi-million pound regeneration. Legal & General Investment Management Real Assets (L&G) will give the city centre space an overhaul as part of a £10 million investment, in conjunction with Manchester City Council. L&G’s lease area is set to be extended in return. Bill Hughes, Head of Real Assets at L&G, said that they see the partnership with Manchester City Council and the proposal for Piccadilly Gardens as a chance to regenerate a prominent and well-used space in central Manchester that is also a thoroughfare to other parts of the city He continued: “Under the proposals L&G will dedicate £2m worth of investment in improvements to Piccadilly Gardens to make them more attractive and welcoming to families while deterring anti-social behaviour. The plans include removing the existing Pavilion building and feature wall and replacing them with two new Pavilion buildings linked by a covered area of new public space for year-round use. Greater Manchester Police have been consulted on the landscaping design “to deter anti-social behaviour and improve natural surveillance”. “The proposed Pavilion design will bring a new vibrancy and economy to Piccadilly Gardens which we hope residents can be proud of and visitors to Manchester will see as a destination in its own right,” Bill Hughes said. “L&G has a longstanding track record of working with progressive local authorities to bring forward regeneration and improvements to social infrastructure projects. We see Piccadilly Gardens as a prime example of this kind of collaboration in action.” The proposals for the Pavilion and Gardens will be undertaken and paid for by L&G. It is estimated that the cost will surpass the £10 million mark, of which £2 million will be invested in public realm improvements.
Construction and infrastructure firm Morgan Sindall has reached a major milestone in its work on a £15.4 million special educational needs school in Essex. Glenwood School is being built for Essex County Council and will offer support for 210 children and young adults who have severe, and multiple, learning difficulties. Morgan Sindall has now begun working on the timber frame structure of the building. Once finished next year, the site will feature 26 spacious classrooms, a hydrotherapy pool and specialist facilities to help meet the sensory needs of the young people. This will include swing therapy rooms and a trampoline room to help promote organisation of the senses, postural control, sequencing space and body awareness. The Morgan Sindall project team will also deliver an independent living area within the school, which will help older students to prepare for adulthood, along with an immersive room that will use projection imagery to simulate a series of different environments. Morgan Sindall Area Director, Gavin Napper, commented: “We’re very pleased to be celebrating this key milestone at Glenwood School. The project team is committed to delivering a truly inspirational space where young people with special educational needs can really enjoy learning and feel safe and secure. “The school includes a number of outstanding facilities and will provide the very best support and learning opportunities for those individuals.” Meanwhile, Morgan Sindall jumped to the top of the monthly league of contract wins in October and took pole position for the first time in the rolling 12 months total of work secured. According to information specialist Glenigan, a trio of big project wins for the contractor tipped the tables. These wins included a £44m school in Tonyrefail for Rhonda Cynon Taff council, a £36.6m infrastructure package at Sighthill in Glasgow for the city council and a £23.6m multi-deck vehicle storage facility in Southampton for ABP.