Date: Fri 15th October, 2010
Venue: The offices of Bruntwood, The Plaza, 100 Old Hall Street, Liverpool, L3 9QJ
Number of Guests Attended: 80
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Is the refurbishment of buildings in the North West getting more intelligent? Finding out was one of the aims of the latest Insider business breakfast, held at The Plaza on Liverpool's Old Hall Street.
The 80-strong audience was treated to insights from a public sector occupier, a retrofit specialist and a developer in Sefton Council's Tony Corfield, Arup's Brian Gowthorpe and Bruntwood chief executive Chris Oglesby.
From Oglesby's viewpoint, the agenda to develop or refit in a more intelligent way is a huge issue, one that has led him into ventures such as the Eco-Cities programme with Manchester City Council.
He said: "Too often there's a disconnect - traditionally landlords let a building, the tenant is responsible for it and pays a dilapidations fee at the end, but they don't really care for it and the building gets into a state - so it gets ripped down. For us, that hasn't been the case in a long time. Everyone in the property chain has tried to take their cut from the occupier but we and others challenged the orthodoxy and we believe we an offer the customer a pound-for-pound better building.
"That's partly because we have dedicated management and customer management teams, so are in a better position to engage with customers and buildings work best when their users are engaged. They've got to know how it works and taking the time to show how it can improve things for everyone is time and money well spent."
Oglesby, in fact, went so far as to say that "only for a relatively small window in an economic cycle is it make sense to build new rather than refurbish - and then you have to increase density levels by 50 per cent".
Gowthorpe agreed that education is the key thing: "Information is a great strength. Sub-metering is the key because once you know which functions are consuming more energy you can start to change behaviour."
Corfield, who is leading the project to redevelop three listed municipal buildings in the heart of Southport's Lord Street into a cultural hub, said: "This area is Southport's biggest cultural asset and forms a major part of our Classic English Resort programme. But they were essentially shot in terms of the fabric of the buildings - the roofs leaked and we couldn't keep anything of value there as we couldn't meet the government's indemnity standards, so we had to loan things out, which is a ridiculous situation.
Sefton took advantage of a window of opportunity presented by Department of Culture, Media & Sport funding, along with "Sea Change" funding for coastal towns. "There was a tight timeframe but we had to act. New build was not an option for us, we wouldn't have been able to get a funding package together for it." In total a £16m cocktail of funding has been assembled. The project started onsite in May this year and will reach completion in late 2012.
The three key elements, Gowthorpe said, are people or behavioural issues, commercial imperatives and technical solutions. Although BREEAM has been criticised elsewhere as a method of measuring the true sustainability of a building, Gowthorpe said.
"Refurbishment is quite a subtle business. Interventions can cancel each other out so you need a set plan of what you're trying to achieve. But generally I heartily commend the BRE's efforts - if the motivation is there from clients and occupiers, there's a lot that can be done with thermal shading, natural ventilation, control zones, smart metering and mixed-mode areas, changing between passive and active. There have been some great technical advances in areas like glazing."
