► Edition 09 (2010): SSV

The Bradford Student spoke to Dan Spencer, Quantity Surveyor of the construction company GB Building Solutions, behind the new Sustainable Student Village (SSV) currently under construction on the edge of campus, following sustainable buildings at Lancaster, York and Leeds Carnegie. With the West End building soon to be cleared a series of sessions were held in the Velocity building on Angel Way where concept images and maps were shown off and the plan for the site revealed and discussed.

As part of the development the West End building will be demolished by the end of February, with the estates department now relocated to the Phoenix building, and on the 22nd February the construction team will take control of the Velocity and adjoining buildings with those facilities relocated to the Listerhills Science Park.

The cabins for the construction team will be appearing on site and they will set about clearing the site, removing asbestos, clearing away shrubbery to form the footprint of the village and general site preparation.

“The scheme itself is made up of 1014 student bedrooms,” Dan Spencer told us, “which are town houses and cluster flats.

“The town houses are made up of a ground floor, which is kitchen, dining, living, and what we’re trying to achieve is community living; an area where you actually live.

“I think the University has probably got an aspiration for its freshers that when you come to university fewer people get homesick because you’re amongst other people, you’re in it together. You create your own atmosphere.

“On the other floors there are four bedrooms for two bathrooms so you share a bathroom between two people, and there are twelve students to each town house. There are 34 town houses in total.”

Dan then moved on to talk about the 6-7 storey cluster flats.

“There are six flats to each kitchen and they’re all en-suite. There are 606 of those. It’s a living space; there’s a dining room, there’s a kitchen.”

The environmental credentials of the project were then discussed. They are planned to be done to BREEAM [Building Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Method] outstanding, with BREEAM measuring the impact buildings will have on the local environment.

“To achieve outstanding there’s a lot of credits you have to achieve and it’s not just put a solar panel on or use a certain form of electricity.

“What we actually do is try and embed into the design a way for people to actually live their lives. For example you have to have four waste streams in a kitchen: paper, plastic, general waste, and inert, so then anything that can be decomposed of will be collected separately.

“The cluster flats themselves are powered by CHP [Combined Heat and Power Association] which takes gas in, which uses less carbon to produce than electricity, and then produces electricity for these cluster flats.

“Electricity is generally used for lighting and power. [With] the hot water system and central heating the by-product of CHP is waste hot water [which] we can take for all the wet radiators in the heating system. You won’t have to use much heat in the buildings as they have been designed that efficiently; the air-leakage is minimal with three air changes, which is way above the industry norm. The u-values [how well a component keeps heat inside a building] of the buildings are extremely high.

“There are solar collectors on each roof to heat water for showering and general hot water for the building, which are then topped up by the gas-fired boilers.

“The town houses are a more traditional central heating system just on a bigger scale as there are twelve bedrooms.

“[There is] rainwater harvesting incorporated in the pond / pool area. It’s not a just a feature, it’s used to retain water on-site instead of sending all it into the sewer. All of the toilets in the cluster flats are actually serviced using the rainwater off the roofs, which is recycled and taken to the ground and pumped back up and fed into the bathroom.”

The trees on the site were discussed and how removing them to build on the site was against the principles of the SSV. Reports on the trees on the site have come back as saying they have a low value and the six species of trees being introduced to the site will improve the site and allow trees to compliment each other and not have them competing for resources and killing each other off.

It was then time for a question and answer session.

“So what facilities are available to encourage students to use cycles over cars?”

“With the assessments in BREEAM you assess the local infrastructure and amenities, and public transport, which is heavily publicised. We’re also trying not to promote the use of cars hence parking facilities are limited; you’re next to a city.

“When a student moves in they get a user pack that tells you what the buildings are; why they’re designed the way they are, and how to make the best use of the building, as these are very efficient buildings if used correctly.

“Obviously if a student is going to put the central heating on and leave a window open all day you can only account for so much. To compensate for that all the radiators are going to have timers on and each town house will have an energy usage monitor screen which will tell you, live to that point in town, how much electricity you’re using and how much gas, and you’ll be able to see the effect of what you’re doing.”

“So you’ll be charging each block separately for each utility… would that cause problems in a block if it’s one student accounting for using more than their fair share of power?”

“I think that’s part of the idea behind the concept, with peer pressure and social pressure. What we’ve found in other universities is that it works fantastically well. Lancaster was where we pioneered it and what they did was to run a competition between town houses… and it worked.”

The design of the buildings was then discussed, in particular with seating areas and areas to be social in, with facilities for televisions and enjoying social time together.

With the independent nature of each town house being key, we raised the topic of whether internet would be something sorted out per house?

“No, it’s all inbuilt, each house will have it. In a bedroom… effectively there will be an Internet connection… we are building the infrastructure in; there will be data points [in the social spaces].”

There will also be the facility to put in wireless points as well to gain benefit from roaming connections and, as Dan Spencer, pointed out, IPTV [TV over the Internet].

The flats in the SSV will come furnished with beds, desks, chairs and sofas, but individual items like duvets and pillows will need to be provided. The town houses and cluster flats will be supported by a reception area, a laundry facility and a couple of retail units.

“Do you know what the retail units will be?”

“They could potentially be a café and a shop, as with 1014 students there will be some need. We’ve allowed for a gas connection in one of the buildings so if it’s required for a café you can.”

“In the pool area will there be seating?”

“Going back to the community / village aspect of it, there [are wooden benches and concrete benches] and, in the same material, barbecue sets built in, so rather than letting students have… the throwaway ones… here are some safe areas to do it in.

“There’s also a viewing gallery; a glazed shelter, a modern-looking structure that will look straight down at the pond. What we don’t want is a bolt-on to the campus; this is part of the campus.”

The topic of security was the next to come up.

“Will each individual house have their own security?”

“Each house will have a key fob that will let you in which links back to security… so they can see what’s happening. Each bedroom has the same, you have your own fob. In a cluster flat, you have one for the building, one for your cluster, and one for your bedroom.”

“What have they thought about lighting on the outside?”

“There are two or three things we have done. We have liaised with the local police officers with ‘Secure By Design’ and they’ve looked at what we’re doing, discussed the Lux levels with them and our design incorporates all their recommendations so hopefully it will be amply lit.

“There’s also a fence on the back of the site. We identified that people coming off this car park area was a risk. There is CCTV that goes back to [security] which is of a police standard, which is what we’ve complied with.”

“How will security in the area work?”

“The [site] will be manned 24-hours and I think the details of the security will be negotiated between the University and the FM [Facilities Management] provider.

“The other thing that was looked at was all of the ground floor windows which have been upgraded to toughened glass and Secure By Design standards.”

The aim of the site, it seems, is to give better accommodation for the University to promote to students as well as providing students with the facts and lifestyle they need to live a sustainable lifestyle.

The Sustainable Student Village is due to be completed by August 2011 with students moving in for that year’s intake. The Bradford Student will keep you up-to-date with the build and you can also look out for a regular newsletter from the construction company.

If you have any comments on this article e-mail them to ubu-mmc@bradford.ac.uk