Project Description
Carnbroe & Sikeside Community Hub project forms part of the North Lanarkshire Council (NLC) estate development programme and is the new build construction of a new primary school comprising Carnbroe & Sikeside Primary Schools together with an Early Learning Centre accommodating 434 primary pupils and 50 nursery pupils. The project will include Primary and Early Years playgrounds incorporating opportunities for outdoor learning and well-being as well as staff / visitor parking and drop-off zones for cars and school buses. The project works are part of a new site redevelopment programme and site preparation works, including stabilisation of an existing mine shaft.
Our Role / Scope
Doig+Smith have been appointed to provide Project Management, Cost Advisor and Principal Designer services on the project.
During the Pre-Construction Stage D+S managed stakeholder and community engagement, programming and formal reporting, inclusive of risk assessment, management and mitigation. The stakeholder and community engagement commenced with in person sessions and workshops and were then developed into online sessions with these groups due to the Covid-19 pandemic. From a cost perspective D+S developed the cost plan in conjunction with the Contractor and reported on costs against the budget. D+S also managed the pre-construction cashflow and provided construction phase cashflows in conjunction with the Contractor.
As the design developed and a design freeze was achieved, Doig+Smith developed and managed the procurement programmes to ensure the project was market tested beyond the 80% market testing criteria and that Financial Close was achieved with a project that delivers best value, does not breach the Clients budget and the Contract value is established and agreed.
Challenges
The key challenges on the project so far have been:
- Contaminated ground and unsafe existing mine working requiring stabilisation which was located adjacent to the main road along the site boundary. This required temporary measures to make safe prior to works commencing in full.
- Scottish Water. Due to issues on other sites with delays caused due to a lack of progress with Scottish Water this was a key aspect that was proactively managed from the outset with early assessment and application with ongoing tracking.
- Achieving required GIFA on budget. Due to the nature of the steeply sloped site with limited scope for building location achieving a design that was both on budget and GIFA, whilst maintaining adequate daylighting levels, proved challenging. Careful coordination of the design team and contractor to understand buildability and groundworks ultimately established a design that accurately met the ACR’s and Accommodation Schedule to the client satisfaction.
- Late client design change requiring re-work. Again careful management and communication was key to conclude in a timeous manner.
Successes
The key successes on the project so far are:
- Intelligent briefing process to determine client
- Early Site Investigations to inform the design and flag any potential issues, such as mine workings
- Soft market testing to prepare the market and understand any cost/buildability issues at an early stage to allow these to be designed out where possible
- Clear and effective communication maintained through national lockdowns and remote working to maintain project progress
- Online consultation with staff, parents and pupils was a resounding success with all fully engaged throughout the design process
Benefits to Client
- Extensive Schools for the Future Experience
- Experienced in bundle project delivery
- Live primary cost data for benchmarking
- Strong relationships with the Design Team