Building Briefs - March 25th

• Jax Asbestos Solutions gears up for growth at East Kilbride development

Environmental consultant Jax Asbestos Solutions Ltd has agreed a ten-year lease on Unit 1D, which extends to 2,500 sq ft.

Jax has more than 20 years of experience, ranging from single to large scale asbestos removal projects in Scotland and around the UK.

• New council homes in Newton Mearns completed

Tenants have started moving into brand new council houses in the Maidenhill area of Newton Mearns as construction on the first phase of the development is completed.

Built for East Renfrewshire Council by Taylor Wimpey West Scotland, these new affordable homes are the first new council houses to be built in Newton Mearns in a generation.

The development, which received £2.3 million funding from the Scottish Government, comprises of 12 one-bed cottage flats, eight two-bedroom cottage flats, two two-bedroom houses, 16 three-bedroom houses and one four-bed house.

Following last year’s COVID-19 lockdown, construction on site safely began in July and the team successfully completed these first builds on time, allowing tenants and families to begin moving into their new homes from mid-April this year. It is expected that all homes will be handed over by the end of September.

As well as providing these high-quality affordable homes for social rent and contributions towards the provision of land and funding for the new Maidenhill Primary School, by the end of 2020, Taylor Wimpey paid over £930,000 in developer contributions for completions of new homes. Further contributions are due in May for the first quarter of this year.

The council and developer have already confirmed an additional 30 affordable homes for social rent, which are targeted for delivery by mid-2022, and discussions are also continuing for a further 13 properties for 2022/23.

This development comes following two years of ambitious house building in Barrhead by the council, with further construction continuing across East Renfrewshire.

• £3.75m to improve rural connectivity

Mobile coverage in some of the most rural parts of Scotland will be improved with an additional £3.75 million investment.

A further nine masts are earmarked for the Scottish Borders, Highlands, Angus and island communities, along with three to replace masts removed earlier this year.

Marking the latest phase of the Scottish 4G Infill (S4GI) infrastructure programme, the masts will provide more rural homes and businesses with 4G mobile connectivity for the first time.

It takes the total funding package for the programme, being delivered by WHP Telecoms, to £28.75m.

• Firm offers engineering apprentice role after one year search

North Ayrshire firm Burnhouse Engineering & Fabrication Ltd has recruited a new fabrication and welding apprentice using the UK Government’s Kickstart scheme.

The scheme aims to tackle the rising issue of youth unemployment by providing funding to small and medium sized enterprises to take on unemployed young people aged between 16 and 24.

Euan Ferguson, 19 from Kilwinning, started the four-year apprenticeship on May 1 after almost a year of unemployment. He had completed an Engineering Pre-Apprenticeship course at the Kilmarnock campus of Ayrshire College in May 2020, just as the first phase of Covid lockdown caused many engineering firms to close their doors.

To find a relevant apprenticeship, he wrote to several engineering companies but had difficulty in securing any interviews. His breakthrough came when he was offered a week’s work experience with Burnhouse Engineering in February 2021. The company later advertised for an Apprentice Fabricator Welder through the Kickstart Scheme to which Euan applied and was successful in being offered the job.

The company have a policy to where possible to recruit and develop a young workforce through training and education. He will undergo on-the-job training at their workshop and attend day release at a local college from September 2021. Another member of the team, Christopher Burwood, 21, is studying for an BEng in Engineering and Manufacturing Design at Strathclyde University.

• Bellway’s Pauline Gibson hits the road for charity

Bellway’s Pauline Gibson put her best foot forward during lockdown to raise money for Cancer Research UK.

Pauline, who is based in the housebuilder’s Scotland West division headquarters in Hamilton, covered more than 10,000 steps a day for the entire month of March as part of the Walk All Over Cancer campaign.

To date the sales administrator has raised £690 with Bellway tripling her total, taking the amount raised to £2,070.

Dedicated Pauline got up early every day to do 5,000 steps before starting work, completing the rest at lunchtime or in the evenings with family and friends.

To her surprise she surpassed her 310,000 target by more than 80,000 steps, completing almost 196 miles, the equivalent of walking from her home in Wishaw to Skye.

Pauline has more reason than most to support the charity – she lost her Mum to breast cancer when she was just 19 and her Dad to lung cancer ten years later.

To donate to Pauline’s fundraising campaign, visit here.

• £1.6m roads programme approved for Badenoch and Strathspey

Members of the Highland Council’s Badenoch and Strathspey area committee today approved the area’s roads programme for 2021/22.

The £1.6 million budget has been made up of the revenue budget of £840,565 (for labour, plant and materials including salt for roads) and a capital budget of £765,310 (to undertake surface dressing and surfacing).

A large portion of this year’s revenue budget is being targeted towards cyclic maintenance, which includes drainage, footpath maintenance, gully cleansing, temporary patching, renewal of road markings, maintenance of signs, verge maintenance and other routine annual work.

Capital works scheduled for this year include £88,000 of patching at bell-mouths and junctions in various villages in the area, £80,325 on 5100m of surface dressing on the B9102 Lettoch – Craigvarren – Advice Junction – Tulchan.

South Street in Grantown on Spey is also set to see £35,000 investment in structural drainage and £63,000 is planned to be spent on the A939 Dava road, phase one.

There are also a number of roads that will see new surface dressing, including 1200m on the B970 Culreach (Balliefurth), 500m on the B970 sub-station to Loch Garten road and 600m on the B970 Loch Garten Junction to Mains of Garten.

Overlay works are also planned on section one of the C1137 Glentrium and the U2264 at Balnagowan. There are also surface dressing works planned for the A938 Balnacruie to Tullochgribban road, the A938 Foregin to Baddengorm road and the Station Road junction in Newtonmore.

• Cowan Park Gate Lodge project gets underway

The Cowan Park Gate Lodge in Barrhead is set to be brought back into community use.

Following a successful public consultation, East Renfrewshire Council is proposing that local charity, Include Me 2 Club, creates a social enterprise hub, café, bike workshop and public toilets which will be used by the local community and visitors to the park.

The project is part-funded by the Scottish Government’s Regeneration Capital Grant Fund and renovation works, led by Procast, began on May 10, with contractors aiming to complete the handover to Include Me 2 Club in October. During this time, the Gate Lodge building will be fenced off to the public.

• Guidance on future Tweedbank expansion to be presented

Guidance detailing how the future expansion of Tweedbank should take place is to be presented to councillors.

Finalised Supplementary Planning Guidance (SPG) will outline the vision and overall direction for the development, which will provide high quality residential and business space.

Included in the finalised SPG is a comprehensive design guide outlining the expected standards in terms of sustainability and design that any potential developers will be required to meet.

The SPG and associated Design Guide will be used to influence planning applications for the development of the site.

A draft version of the SPG was initially presented to and approved by Scottish Borders Council in January 2020 and was followed by a 12-week public consultation. This included a public exhibition in the Tweedbank Community Centre and offered members of the public an opportunity to provide feedback on the proposals.

The SPG is a key component of the Tweedbank Masterplan, a transformational prospectus which will encourage people to live, learn, visit and work in the local community.

Land adjacent to the existing Tweedbank village was initially earmarked as part of the council’s Local Development Plan (LDP), via Housing Planning Guidance, in 2017 to address a shortfall of housing land in the region due to its strong rail links, high-quality landscape setting and already established housing market.

It’s estimated that the Tweedbank development could create 350 jobs and generate £150 million of Gross Value Added (GVA) to the Borders economy, whilst also making a significant contribution to meeting local housing need and associated Scottish Government requirements.

Both the finalised SPG and Design Guide will be discussed at the council’s Planning and Building Standards Committee on May 31, before being presented to full council next month.  

• Former railway yard supports work to reinstate Levenmouth rail link

Network Rail has taken delivery of sixteen thousand sleepers that will form part of the new Levenmouth Rail link.

The sleepers have been delivered to and are being stored in Thornton Yard, to the west of the branch line, ahead of major work to deliver the project from early 2022.

The sleepers were delivered over a four-week period with a proportion of the former shunting yard being given over to storing the components while the old rails are lifted and cleared and the new railway formation is created.

As well as reinstating 19 single track kilometres of railway, the Levenmouth project will create new stations at Leven and Cameron Bridge and offer two trains an hour into Edinburgh with one each way via Dunfermline and Kirkcaldy respectively.

• Aberfoyle Primary School reopens after extensive refurbishment

Children and staff at Aberfoyle Primary School have spoken of their joy after their historic school building reopened last week following an estimated £1.3 million refurbishment.

The major investment saw the remodelling and renovation of the 151-year-old building and a vacant adjoining school house to provide additional learning space.

All four classrooms are now located in the main school building and have been transformed into modern, bright and fully equipped learning spaces. 

Stirling Council worked closely with a conservation architect and the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Planning Authority to ensure sympathetic restoration and refurbishment of the structure, which dates back 1870.

The main works at the school, which has a capacity of 100, were due to start in spring 2020 but were delayed until last summer due to the first Covid-19 lockdown.

Entering the school at the repurposed school house, there is now a welcoming new entrance, along with offices, meeting spaces, staff accommodation and other ancillary spaces, before heading into the main school building.

The new main entrance is also now fully accessible and inclusive for all users, while significant building fabric improvements will also cut the carbon footprint of the building with full replacement of the slate roof, upgraded insulation and new efficient heating emitters and controls.