Building Briefs – November 6th

• DM Hall’s young professionals sweep the board in RICS assessments

Four out of four of the Scotland-wide firm’s young stars who sat the Assessment of Professional Competence (APC) have passed with flying colours, qualifying them as members of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS).

DM Hall said their achievement highlights the firm’s commitment to diversity of talent and its encouragement of staff who want to further their professional careers through non-traditional routes.

It also brings to eight in total the number of new fully-qualified staff this year, following a similar success in May for four young surveyors in Glasgow, Edinburgh and Falkirk.

The four surveyors who qualified this time are Calum Riach, who began his time in property as an estate agent before joining DM Hall in the Inverness office; Graham Wilson in the Musselburgh and Galashiels offices, who worked in residential property management with a letting agency before joining DM Hall in 2018; Kevin Masson, who trained to be a bricklayer before studying building surveying at Robert Gordon University in Aberdeen and then taking up a graduate position with the firm and Duncan Clow, whose academic career focused on international relations and management studies, then finance and real estate.

• Arrangements confirmed for upcoming tram works on Constitution Street

The Trams to Newhaven project team has today confirmed arrangements for the upcoming construction works on Constitution Street and enabling works on Leith Walk, which will get under way in mid-November. 

Letters have been delivered to residents and businesses in the affected areas to advise them of traffic management, communal bin collection arrangements, diversions for bus services, as well as the suspension of parking on Constitution Street during the works.

An information event about the works will be held at South Leith Parish Church on Thursday 7 November from 12 noon - 7.30pm, allowing residents and businesses to meet the Trams to Newhaven project team and raise any queries. 

A logistics hub is to be set up in Mitchell Street to support Constitution Street businesses with deliveries and dispatches. Residents expecting large deliveries can also obtain help from the logistics hub. 

A Support for Business package will be in operation once construction gets under way, devised in consultation with businesses in the area. This will include a local voucher scheme, an ‘Open for Business’ campaign across a range of media, a business continuity fund and free business improvement courses.

• Flexenergy’s fusion jointed pipe work used for Ibroxholm Oval Development

The thermal efficiency of a district heating scheme in Glasgow is being optimised thanks to the use of pre-insulated polybutylene pipe from Flexenergy.

The pipe technology was selected to minimise the thermal losses of heated water being transported to a new housing development at the Ibroxholm Oval and because the material meant key elements of the network could be prefabricated offsite.  

Flexenergy supplied 500 metres of polybutylene pipe for the project, which comprises 65 apartments available for rent, with elbows and T-pieces prefabricated at the company’s Scotland base using electrofusion jointing to reduce the network installation time on-site.

Bespoke building entry risers were also supplied, along with V-Flex valves which allow sections of the network to be isolated for maintenance. The valve system can also facilitate extension of the district heating scheme in the future, if needed.    

• Dingwall leisure centre repair works near completion

Contractors are finalising repair works to the underside of Dingwall Swimming Pool, which will enable replacement ventilation to be fitted.  

The Highland Council has arranged for a specialist industrial cleaning firm to come on site to begin a “deep clean” of the pool and surrounding areas before it is re-opened to pool users.  

Works are expected to be completed in time to allow High Life Highland to re-open the swimming pool to users on November 18. 

• Fife welcomes young builders from Norway and Poland

An action-packed week is underway for 25 pupils from Poland and Norway who are visiting the region to learn about traditional buildings in Scotland, thanks to Fife Council.

Pupils from St Andrews RC High School, in Kirkcaldy, are sharing their building knowledge and skills with their new friends from Norway and Poland.

The visitors are spending time in the classroom and at Fife College workshops where they will learn about Scottish traditional buildings and have a go at slating, Scottish-style.

Later in the week they will visit the Scottish Lime Centre, St Andrews, Dunfermline, Edinburgh and Historic Environment Scotland’s training hub, The Engine Shed in Stirling. They will also experience lime mortar being “slaked”, painting techniques and stone masonry.

Led by Fife Council, programme partners are also developing learning resources for general use in second year high schools, for an N4/N5 course that is being piloted as part of the project. This includes training for teachers. Resources will be available after the project.

• Padlocks to be removed from Inverness bridges

The Highland Council will be removing padlocks and any other attachments from the Infirmary and Greig Street footbridges in Inverness.

The local authority said the padlocks detract from the historic nature of the bridges as well as causing paint damage and encouraging rust spots.
There have also been incidents of pedestrians and cyclists catching clothing on them whilst passing each other.