Building Briefs – November 25th

Work has started on a £3.4 million project to provide high quality homes in Abbeyview, Dunfermline.

Fife Housing Group, working in partnership with Persimmon Homes and Fife Council, has now moved on to a site at Islay Road, Dunfermline.

The site will be developed with 28 energy-efficient one and two bedroomed flats and five cottage-type houses.

The Islay Road development is the final stage of the £17.5m, 170 home Abbeyview Regeneration project first launched in 2000.

The homes are due to be completed and occupied by next year. Abbeyview Phase Four – comprising two and three bedroomed houses on Abbeyview’s Duncan Crescent - was completed earlier this year with all now tenants moved in.

Private rents in Edinburgh second highest in the UK

Edinburgh’s rental property market is the least affordable in Scotland, and second only to London, new figures have shown.

An analysis of the private rental sector in 16 cities across the UK, revealed in The Scotsman, calculated the most ­expensive and the cheapest places to rent, compared with local incomes.

It revealed that Edinburgh was the least affordable in Scotland, with rent costs taking up 47 per cent of net income, on a par with Birmingham, and second only to London, where renters part with 49 per cent of net earnings to keep a roof over their heads.

When it comes to the cheapest, Glasgow was placed fifth equal with Norwich, with rents in both cities eating into 35 per cent of a person’s income.

The figures, released by rental insurance company HomeLet, also show that the average cost of rents across Scotland fell by 4.4 per cent, from £614 to £587 between September and October this year, though analysts say this is a common seasonal drop.

However, when compared year-on-year, rents in Scotland have risen by 2.6 per cent from £572 in October last year. Despite this increase, the average Scottish rentals figure is still well behind the average UK rent, excluding the Greater London area, of £675, a rise of 4.9 per cent from October 2013.

Two empty Midlothian buildings to become homeless accommodation

Midlothian Council is set to turn two disused buildings in Penicuik and Poltonhall into temporary accommodation for homeless households.

Plans were approved to re-use the empty Pentland House and Midfield House at a council meeting last week.

The plans have been approved in principle pending planning, building standards and HMO Licensing approval.

A full public consultation was carried out with the local community where residents were given the chance to have their say on the proposals.

North Lanarkshire Council repair team’s energy efficiency drive

North Lanarkshire Council’s Local Homes Energy Team is the number one local authority team in Scotland for delivering energy improvement works, tackling fuel poverty, reducing the cost of heating homes and improving the quality of lives of its residents, according to Scottish Government figures.

The team carried out over 13,500 new energy efficiency measures for 2013/14 – an increase of 143 per cent from the previous year’s performance - in both social and private housing. Measures ranging from loft insulation, cavity wall insulation, renewing boilers and installing double glazed windows are saving our residents on average £135 each year in domestic energy bills and reducing our carbon emissions.

Energy assessors carry out detailed inspections of homes, determining current energy ratings and the potential rating should ECO works be undertaken.

In addition, we’ve also increased the number of owner occupiers participating in common works such as external wall insulation.

Properties in Abronhill, Birkenshaw, Netherton, Holytown, Chapelhall and Petersburn have benefitted from external wall insulation following our successful bid for funding from the Scottish Government’s Funding Stream – Home Energy Efficiency Programmes Scotland (HEEPS).

Marine science park opens at Dunstaffnage near Oban

A European Marine Science Park has been opened in Argyll in a bid to encourage new businesses in Scotland’s growing life sciences sector.

The development, at Dunstaffnage, near Oban, aims to build up a centre of excellence for new and expanding firms and support up to 125 jobs in future.

When complete, it will have 20,000 sq ft of office and laboratory space.

Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE) owns the park and supported phase one of the build with a £7.5m grant.

The park is being built next to the Scottish Association for Marine Science (SAMS) laboratories at Dunstaffnage.

Perth Crematorium road plan ‘almost sacrilegious’

Nearly 1,800 people have signed an online petition outlining their opposition to plans to drive a road through the grounds of Perth Crematorium.

As part of a masterplan to ease congestion on the city’s western edge, Perth and Kinross Council proposals are for a road linking Crieff Road with Inveralmond via a bridge over the bypass that would involve land at the crematorium.

More than four acres of land around McDiarmid Park are also the subject of a potential compulsory purchase order for the scheme.

Fears have been raised by the signatories to Save Perth Crematorium of the impact the proposed new road would have, as it takes in part of the crematorium’s Winter Garden and Bluebell Garden.

While these are not official parts of the Garden of Remembrance, many people have scattered the ashes of loved ones in this area and the prospect of a road is causing considerable distress.