PRESIDENT’S COLUMN Keys handed over for steelframed
8 NSC
May 20
Scottish Borders Council has taken possession of
the newly-completed Jedburgh Grammar Campus
following handover by its development partner hub
South East and main contractor BAM Construction.
Designed by Stallan Brand, the new Jedburgh
Grammar Campus is an innovative learning space,
which will serve pupils aged from two up to 18, as
well as providing further education opportunities and
community facilities.
It replaces all three schools in the town and will
have provision for nursery, primary, secondary and
additional support needs pupils.
Community facilities include a multi-use games
area, 2G hockey pitch, 3G sports pitch, 100m synthetic
running track, 300m grass track and gym.
Alongside classrooms, there will be a rural skills
area, flexible hall space that can be used for multiple
activities such as community events, sport, dance or
drama classes and a café.
The public library and contact centre will also be
housed in the campus.
Martin Cooper, Construction Director, BAM
Construction, said: “It’s a great achievement for
everyone involved. Our site team have faced a few
unexpected hurdles along the way, but throughout the
project we’ve had the full support of both hub South
East and Scottish Borders Council, so this really has felt
like a partnership in the true sense of the word. We are
delighted to leave Jedburgh with such a positive legacy.”
Hescott Engineering fabricated, supplied and
erected 800t of structural steelwork for the project.
Tekla launches
remote working
packages for BIM
Trimble Tekla UK has announced a series of new
support measures, designed to help its customers with
the challenges currently facing the BIM industry.
In light of the ongoing social distancing rules, Tekla
has created a new dedicated support section on its
website, containing practical advice and information
on how customers can successfully access its software
products, including Tekla Structures, Tekla Structural
Designer and Tekla Tedds, remotely.
The company has also announced that it has
extended its free trial offering of Tekla Model Sharing
- an innovative collaboration tool that enables project
teams to work on the same model at the same time,
without fear of their work colliding.
Richard Fletcher, Regional Business Director at
Tekla, said: “Right now, given these difficult times,
ensuring effective collaboration and communication
processes, both within a business and between
project parties, has never been so crucial. Whether
you’re working at home, in the office or as part of a
dispersed design team, cloud-based software, such
as our Trimble Connect, and collaboration tools and
technologies can make a real difference in helping
keep businesses moving.
“Likewise, we want our customers to know that we
remain here to help and support them, whether that
be through practical remote access guides, flexible
licensing or local support desks.”
News
We’re all acclimatising ourselves to new ways
of working. For most steelwork contractors the
restrictions have resulted in home working and
social distancing in factories and offices, where being
organised and planning work around the social
distancing requirements is paramount. There were
some mixed messages at the start of the lockdown,
but this was a temporary measure to introduce better
health and safety measures and the majority of sites in
England and Wales are now open.
The social restrictions have now been in place for
six weeks as thoughts focus on the future and the ‘new
normal’. Most of us have taken to virtual meetings
using ‘video conferencing’ and while for many this
was a new way of communicating, the benefits of not
having to travel long distances for short meetings
are clear enough. As one CEO put it, “for a meeting in
London I usual get up at 5.30am catch the 7.30am to
London, hold a meeting from 10.30 until 15.30 and
take the 17.30 train home. With video conferencing
I don’t have to leave the office and I can have five
meetings a day”. The benefits of virtual meetings are
obvious and its highly likely that the new normal will
involve less travelling and more virtual meetings. It’ll
not be just the FD that likes that one, the dog gets an
extra walk.
The industry is also looking forward and trying
to gauge what the steelwork market will look like in
Q3 and beyond. We may be concerned that clients
could shelve projects during the lockdown and only
proceed when the uncertainty is over. This will surely
have an effect on the construction market in Q3 and
Q4. This is why the BCSA wrote to the Rt Hon Alok
Sharma MP, Secretary of State for Business, Energy
and Industrial Strategy, urging him to encourage the
public and private sectors not to suspend projects,
but to continue with their schemes and, as a matter
of urgency, progress with the infrastructure projects
promised in the budget so that the work is brought
on-stream later this year. I think this message was clear
and I was very pleased to see HS2 recently get the
green light. This is a sector that gets cash into the GDP
very quickly, and that’s really important for everyone.
Every pound spent in infrastructure could generate
nearly three into the GDP.
BCSA has also been trying to estimate the effects
of the lockdown on the market for constructional
steelwork. Assuming that the lockdown is in place
for between 6 and 8 weeks and that construction
sites continue to implement the social distancing
guidelines, the estimate is that the effect will be to
reduce the market by 46% in Q2, 5.1% in Q3 and to
gain 5.5% in Q4. They also estimate the market will
grow by 7.8% in 2021. This is only one estimate and if
correct would be one of the better outcomes.
The good news is that the constructional steelwork
industry is in good shape. Supply chains are doing
their best to service customers with the supply of
steel stock, engineering, fabrication and materials
right through the chain. I for one, have been really
impressed by the can-do attitude of the industry, one
that keeps everyone as safe and operational as can be.
Tim Outteridge
BCSA President
Borders school
City councillors have voted unanimously in favour
of plans for Birmingham's landmark HS2 Curzon
Street station.
The £571M station will eventually link
Birmingham with London, Manchester and Leeds
via a new "Y"-shaped network of tracks for 225mph
trains, as part of the £106bn national project.
The design by WSP and Grimshaw Architects
includes seven platforms and a main entrance facing
the city centre comprising a sheer wall of glass of up
to 17m in height and 69m wide. The main building
features an arched roof clad in metal panels and
supported by large buttresses for the western part.
HS2 is aiming to create one of the most
environmentally-friendly railway stations in the
world – delivering net zero carbon in operation.
The design adopts the latest eco-friendly design
and sustainable technologies including capturing
rainwater and sustainable power generation, with
over 2800m2 of solar panels located on platform
canopies.
Birmingham HS2
Curzon Street
station gets
planning approval
/Jedburgh_Intergenerational_Community_Campus
/Education_buildings
/Fabrication
/Construction#Steel_erection
/Modelling_and_analysis#Modelling
/Design
/Multi-storey_office_buildings
/Health_and_safety
/Construction
/Fabrication
/Steel-supported_glazed_facades_and_roofs
/Operational_carbon
/Operational_carbon#Low_and_zero_carbon_.28LZC.29_technologies