News

A major blaze destroyed the roof of the historic headquarters of the Co-operative Wholesale Society and brought part of Manchester city centre to a standstill last Tuesday evening. Wates Construction was renovating the grade II-listed six-storey building into offices as part of the £800m Noma redevelopment. Eight fire engines raced to the former CWS building, near Victoria railway station, when the alarm was raised at around 5.30pm. Over 50 firefighters battled for four hours to get the high-rise blaze under control, which appears to have destroyed the pitched roof section of the building. Tram services were halted in the area and electricity supplies were isolated as a precaution. A fire service drone flew over the scene as part of the operation to pick …

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A new study conducted on behalf of a UK-based medical website has revealed that three quarters of the British public will risk their health by not going to doctors appointments because of work commitments or being too busy within their careers. Furthermore, the study revealed that the sectors most likely to risk their health because of their work commitments was those working in marketing and the media, construction workers and food and hospitality professionals.  In a bid to discover more about how seriously Britons take their health and how much of a priority it is, a new piece of research undertaken on behalf of an online pharmaceutical company has revealed how often the average Briton will risk their health because of other commitments and which …

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A new study conducted by leading experts in the field of radon gas management has revealed that more than three quarters of Britons with home extensions built underground are not aware of the dangers surrounding the gas radon prior to having the work carried out on their property, despite it being the second leading cause of lung cancer in the UK. In a bid to raise awareness of the dangers of undetected radon, a new study aimed at highlighting how low the awareness of the gas is amongst the British public has revealed that the vast majority of homeowners who’ve undergone basement excavations or dig-down home extensions/conversions were not made aware of radon prior to the work taking place. The team at www.propertECO.co….

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Chinese developer Greenland Group has submitted plans to build a 67-floor residential skyscraper at the western end of the north dock in Canary Wharf . The redevelopment of Hertsmere House at West India Quay will deliver 869 flats within a 240.5m tall building, designed by architect HOK around a clover shaped footprint to maximise views for each flat. When built it is expected to hold the record as the tallest block of flats in Europe. The basement runs to a depth of just 11.7m as the site sits above Crossrail running tunnels, although all piling will be outside the Crossrail exclusion zone. Affordable housing will be included in the western wing of the building. Around half the building facade is to be fitted with vision glass and the remainder …

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Construction output figures for August fell 4.3% against the previous month and marked the biggest year on year decline since May 2013. The slide in the monthly output data was driven by a sharp drop in refurbishment and maintenance work. Compared with August 2014, total construction output dropped 1.3%, but new work was actually up 3.1%. More reliable three-month data showed new work increased by 0.7% from June – August 2015, compared with the previous three months, while repair and maintenance hiccuped with a 3.6% decrease. The picture is better comparing the output data for three months to last year when with all new work up by 5.6%, but repair and maintenance down by 4.6%. Mark Robinson, Scape Group Chief Executive, said:  “Today’s figures need to be dissected and examined …

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Siemens and Fluor have been fined £650,000 after a worker was killed and another seriously injured during construction of an offshore wind farm. The incident happened when a team of engineers were loading wind turbine blades onto a sea barge for delivery to Greater Gabbard, off the Suffolk coast, on 21 May 2010. During the loading of wind turbine components at Pakeston Quay, Harwich, a 2.11 tonne part of the blade transport arrangement fell off, crushing and fatally injuring one worker and seriously injuring another. Chelmsford Crown Court heard both workers were employed by Siemens Windpower A/S (SWP) but were working for Fluor Ltd, the principal contractor. The injured man, Frank Kroeger, was airlifted to Addenbrookes hospital in Cambridge where he was resuscitated twice. He suffered a ruptured spleen, …

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At Beacon we are always looking for ways to help our customers save money – but do you know how much could be saved by implementing these energy saving tips?

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Families were evacuated from their homes last Wednesday night when a giant sinkhole opened up on a street in St Albans. Hertfordhsire County Council had been made aware of a small hole earlier in the week and had sent a team to inspect it. But the sinkhole suddenly opened up creating a crater 20 metres wide and 10 metres deep. A Hertfordshire County Council spokesman told the BBC: “We were informed about a hole in the footpath last week. It was inspected and barriers put around it on Monday. “Work was scheduled to fill it in this morning. Following our inspection, there was no reason to suspect that the hole would collapse.” Highways engineers are currently assessing the scene before the crater is filled in.

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The CITB is cutting its bloated management structure as it fights for survival. The training body has started consultation over redundancies among its current 188 “middle management positions” The plan is to initially cut numbers by 14% – or 26 roles. Latest figures from the CITB show that in 2014 it employed 1,457 direct and temporary employees – more than all but the biggest construction companies. The Government has launched consultation over an industry-wide training levy for large firms which threatens the whole future of the CITB. Adrian Belton, Chief Executive of the Construction Industry Training Board (CITB), said: “For the past 18 months, CITB has been transforming itself to better meet the needs of industry. “We have a revamped Executive and Leadership Team, a new board appointed in January of …

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Highways England has formally invited bids for specialist works contracts under its new road maintenance regime for the East Midlands. The roads body is abandoning asset support style contracts to replace the Area 7 managing agent deal with a more traditional contract model bringing control of maintenance in-house once again. It made the decision to use Area 7 as a test-bed for a different approach after announcing at the start of the year that it would rerun five ASC regions bid races. Previous bids were rejected because of a mismatch between contractor’s low bid prices and quality of service expected. The new one-off framework is now being estimated at £500m over four years, rather than a £300m costing used in previous estimates. It will see Highway England shifting from relying …

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