Buckingham Group Contracting has just started demolition work to clear the way for a £30m ice skating centre in London’s Lee Valley.

The project designed by Faulkner Browns will replace the 34-year old Lee Valley Ice Centre with two Olympic size rinks.

The centre would be the first twin-pad venue in the south of England, and will also feature a new gym and exercise studio.

Lee Valley Regional Park Authority is promoting the scheme, which will be built in two phases to maintain an open ice rink at the site at all times during construction.

The consultant team includes structural and civil engineer Expedition and MEP engineer Max Fordham.

The proposed building will have an 80,000 sq ft footprint and rise 10.5m in height.

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Highways England is switching to use of warm mix asphalts as standard in the push towards net zero carbon emissions.

The material has been in limited use since 2015 but required a special application for use from the supply chain.

Highways England is now asking all those involved in the construction and maintenance of the strategic road network, particularly designers and main contractors, to utilise warm mix asphalts as standard.

WMA technologies can offer enhanced efficiencies and lower production carbon, with CO2 savings of up to 15% when compared to conventional hot mix asphalts.

Produced at temperatures up to 40°C lower than the 190°C needed for traditional asphalts the decision promises big benefits.

If all production in the UK switched to WMAs, it would save around 61,000 tonnes of CO2e a year, the equivalent of cutting around 300m miles of car journeys.

It would also help save up to £70m a year through an increase in shift outputs and can be recycled back into new asphalts, preventing waste.

Malcolm Dare, executive director of Commercial and Procurement at Highways England, said: “This is a big step forward for Highways England that allows us to not only achieve huge efficiency savings but also reduce carbon as we strive for net zero.

“We are altering our way of working to encourage and enable the use of warm mix asphalts as standard across the supply chain, which has efficiency, sustainability, and health and safety benefits while not compromising performance.”

WMAs account for significant volumes worldwide – almost 40% of asphalt production in the USA and over 15% in France.

But WMAs remain under-utilised in the UK, where they currently represent less than 4% of overall asphalt production.

Paul Gott, Project Sponsor from Morgan Sindall Infrastructure, said: “We are delighted that we’ve formed a group from across the supply chain who are focused on embedding carbon reduction measures across Highways England’s schemes.

“Warm mix asphalt is the first carbon efficiency project on the groups extensive carbon reduction plan, which is evolving and already identifies several short, medium and longer-term goals.”

Tim Jordan, Project Delivery Lead from Balfour Beatty added: “We are proud to be working collaboratively with both Highways England and our industry partners to drive meaningful, sustainable change in the supply chain as we work towards a net-zero future.”

Malcom Simms, Director of the Mineral Products Association, added: “We and members have been working closely with Highways England for a number of years to provide the evidence of the benefits of Warm Mix Asphalts, in order to give specifiers the confidence to make a shift to these solutions.”

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Blackpool-based Fox Brothers has bought North West civil engineer and highways contractor J J O’Grady to further extend its range of services.

Established in 2006, Preston-based J J O’Grady has a track record of working with local authorities, housing developers and civil engineering contractors.

Under the terms of the deal, J J O’Grady continues to trade under its own name within the Fox Group of companies.

Established in 1932, Fox employs around 80 staff and specialises in the supply and haulage of aggregates, recycled materials, muck-shift, earthworks and civil engineering projects. Last year revenues totalled £16m, slipping from £22m because of Covid.

Fox director John Flood said: “The acquisition makes perfect strategic sense for our business as  J J O’Grady adds several different services and different customers, including local authorities.

“It has an excellent reputation, and we believe it has a great deal of potential to grow.

“We will be able to offer clients a more complete solution from site preparation through to highways and street maintenance.

“Our focus is on providing a single-source solution for local authorities, housebuilders, infrastructure, construction and civils contractors.”

Founder Seamus O’Grady will stay in the business, which continues day-to-day operations from its base at Lostock Hall.

Flood added “We would like to thank our non-executive director, Owen McLaughlin, for his support through the acquisition process.”

In September 2020  Fox acquired Clive Hurt (Plant Hire) to create the largest provider of haulage and plant hire services in Lancashire, with a 180-strong fleet of wagons and over 400 items of plant and machinery.

Flood added: “We will continue to look  for other opportunities to expand our services.”

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Sir Robert McAlpine’s managing director of the London business, Paul Heather, has suddenly left the business.

Heather joined McAlpine from Skanska nearly five years ago, where he had been working as managing director of its succesful London and the South East team.

A source told the Enquirer: “We suddenly got an email saying he was leaving the business, nothing else.”

He will be replaced by Alison Cox, who was McApines’s executibve director of engineering and technical services, the first woman to undertake the Director of Engineering and Technical Services role in the company’s 150-year history.

Before herBefore her appointment to the executive board in January, Cox was project director on McAlpine’s high profile Battersea Power Station Phase 3A project.

A McAlpine spokesperson said: “We can confirm that Alison Cox is assuming responsibility for our London region with immediate effect. We have no further comment to make at this time.”

The hunt is starting for a design and build contractor to transform the Grade 1 listed Citadel buildings into a new Carlisle city centre campus for the University of Cumbria.

The £77m project proposes a comprehensive redevelopment of the adjacent site led by the delivery of the new 13,800 sqm campus for the University of Cumbria as the anchor occupier with associated leisure and cultural elements to increase vitality into the city centre.

It is being developed jointly by Cumbria County Council, Carlisle City Council and the University of Cumbria working with Cumbria LEP as a key partner.

As part of the planned transformation of the Citadel, demolition has just started on Paton House Buildings at the rear of the site.

Demolition of the Paton House buildings is a key part of setting the groundworks for the ambitious city centre redevelopment project.

For more information click here or email Dawn Davidson.

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