Elemental

CASPAR (city centre apartments for single people at affordable rents), a development of 42 apartments on North St in Leeds (just opposite Hansa’s Gujarati curry house) is now to be demolished. The Yorkshire Post have the latest developments here. Guardian report here and Treehugger comment here.

It’s a cautionary tale. What lessons are to be learnt?

The site was initially open to competition and won by Levitt Bernstein on behalf of the client, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation. Contractor was Kajima UK Engineering Ltd, structural engineers were Alan Conisbee and Associates and Services Engineers were Max Fordham and Partners. According to RIBA contract value was £2,432,916 and was reportedly built without subsidy. JRF expected a return of 6.2%, compared to their average portfolio of 2.9%. Each apartment cost in the region of £60k to build, high for apartments, especially for one occupant dwellings.

The project won much acclaim after it’s completion in 2000 and won awards with both RIBA and the Civic Trust. The SDC (Sustainable Development Commission) have the development rated as a 5 star sustainable case study. The energy efficiency of the development appears to be very good. Where it was obviously fallen down on the sustainable front is that instead of the 60 year expected lifespan, the development has lasted less than 7 years.

The concept of the design was prefab offsite construction carried out by Volumetric in Bedfordshire, part of Potton Group, whose expertise include other modular buildings such as Travelodges. The reason for the initial evacuation, after an investigation by Arup, was “potentially catastrophic structural problems“. The flats have a 2% chance of collapsing in exceptionally high winds. The problem appears to lie with how the units were put together once they arrived on site (hints of what might have gone wrong can be found in the comments here, including putting the ground floor flats on the fifth floor – oops!). Treehugger describe the false economy of deciding to go semi-volumetric (some flat pack, some pods – such as bathrooms and kitchens):

The project team is generally of the view that the decision to go semi-volumetric proved a false economy, as the challenge of tight, steeply sloping site, large overhanging roof and semi-circular plan combined to exert unmanageable pressure on the assembly of flat packs to keep up with the pace of pod delivery.

Further details of the project can be found here and here. CABE still have the details to CASPAR I in Birmingham (a different construction method was used), but there is now no sign of the CASPAR II case study.

The new scheme to take the place of the demolished building will be developed by local developer LifeHomes and local architect 2B. The old scheme was in general well received and despite the problems will probably be fondly remembered. LifeHomes are in talks with planners to see how the spirit of CASPAR can be retained.

The lessons that can be taken away from this are all in the delivery of the project once it hit site. There appears to have been both logistical and communication problems. Anecdotal evidence points to too many pods and flatpacks arriving on site too quickly, pressuring the operatives on site to construct even faster and mistakes being made about which pods went where. I would love to know if a full time clerk of works was employed on this job – could better site inspection have prevented these mistakes?

All this ended up being a mistake too costly to rectify without demolition. Whilst these mistakes are ultimately linked to MMC (modern methods of construction), the proximate reason lies in the delivery, rather than the method of construction. This, I believe, is a problem that can be identified and resolved in the future now it has happened once, rather than to damn MMC to the scrap heap. I’m all for learning from the lessons of others. It seems there is the potential to learn much more from mistakes than successes.

mel starrs Uncategorized Alan Conisbee, Birmingham, Civic Trust, energy efficiency, GBP, Joseph Rowntree Foundation, Kajima UK Engineering Ltd, Leeds, Max Fordham, Potton Group, RIBA, Sustainability, Sustainable Development Commission

I’m unashamedly pinching my topic today from a great post over at Inhabitat last week on ‘The Next Big Thing in Green Building‘. Guest writer Jared summarises his finding from the Developing Green conference. His four key ideas were learn, zero, sell and people. What I love about this medium (the internet) is the realisation that the exact same issues are topical here in Leeds as 4500 miles away in Seattle:

Learn – post occupancy studies were all the rage when I began in this industry almost 10 years ago. The PROBE studies were in full flow and it never even occurred to me that people would ever NOT monitor what happens in a building once it’s built. Unfortunately the funding for PROBE dried up and the topic had since fallen out of favour. It’s starting to make a welcome comeback on most people’s radar. BSRIA have started a project ‘building bridges between FM and design‘ looking at feedback loops between building operators, designers and managers. The quote I liked the best was this:

‘Inevitably, one gets what one asks for. When one buys a cheap electrical appliance, one shouldn’t be surprised if it comes with a generic, badly-translated manual.’

Whilst searching for what ever happened to PROBE I came across ‘Usable Buildings‘ which looks to have some useful information, as well as an archive of all the original PROBE studies (over 20) originally published in BSJ. One of the one’s I particularly remember was the Queen’s Building at de Montfort Uni (picture above courtesy of Leicester’s environment city site). No.4 was co-written by a current colleague of mine, and Bill Bordass had a hand in most of the others (and seems to own the Usable Buildings website). Bill, along with Max Fordham, is one of the great characters and pioneers of the industry.

I’ll skip over zero (too much to write about that in this post!) and go straight to sell. As Jared quite rightly points out:

‘It is possible to develop a green building within traditional budgets and make a profit. But it’s more than life-cycle analyses and reduced operating costs. Jerry Yudelson, associate principal at Interface Engineering, and author of The Insider’s Guide to Marketing Green Buildings, talked about marketing value and quality. There is the immediate pitch to buyers upon construction, but the longer-term impact may be the bigger story. As energy prices skyrocket, buildings that perform more efficiently will be less risky investments and more valuable to future owners and tenants. And as more states and cities enact laws and mandates requiring LEED certification and other sustainable building practices, green properties will be more and more the norm.’

Translated to UK, read BREEAM for LEED and try to imagine the consequences of EPBD on the property market over the next 10 years. The way that property is financed, especially private commercial buildings, is not currently set up to complement this – the disconnect between who commissions the building and who ultimately pays the bills is too great. REIT‘s may improve the situation – we’ll have to see.

And this leads us neatly to people, or the folk who ultimately have to sit in the building, pay the bills and maintain it. Which brings us full circle back to learn. Neat.

admin Opinion Bill Bordass, BREEAM, Energy, environment city site, EPBD, Green Building, Jared, Jerry Yudelson, Leeds, Marketing, Max Fordham, Procurement, REIT, Seattle, Sustainability, United Kingdom