Building Briefs – May 21st

Provost opens Angus Housing Association development in Forfar

Angus Council Provost, Ronnie Proctor, officially opened Angus Housing Association’s 20 house development at Restenneth Fields in Forfar last week.

Part of a much larger scheme with over 200 houses for sale, the Restenneth Fields site was developed by Forfar-based developer Guild Homes. The 20 rented homes were provided as part of a planning agreement with Angus Council and consist of 12 x 2 bedroomed single storey semi detached houses and 8 x 3 bedroomed semi detached houses.

The average cost of each house was £121,000 and the total value of the contract was just over £2.4 million.

Restenneth Fields is the third project undertaken by AHA in partnership with Guild Homes, following on from two previous developments in Kirriemuir. Work is also underway on a small project to build 2 full wheelchair accessible homes at Kingsmuir and plans are well advanced for a further large scale joint venture in Forfar.

Affordable housing investment continues in Clackmannanshire

Clackmannanshire Council is working with the Scottish Government and local partners to ensure that recent investment in delivering affordable housing for local people continues in the years ahead.

In 2017-18, over £5 million was invested in Clackmannanshire which resulted in 76 new builds and 11 properties bought on the open market. This continues the record number of new rented housing in the area.

The Scottish Government has confirmed that a further £5.074 million will be invested in housing in Clackmannanshire over the year ahead. Combined with funding from the council’s Capital budget of £1.2 million, the local authority will be working in partnership with Kingdom Housing Association and other registered social landlords to deliver new social housing across Clackmannanshire.

Redevelopment works begin at historic Tolbooth Hotel in Banff

Work is underway to redevelop the exterior of the former Tolbooth Hotel in Banff.

The scheme, which is part of efforts to regenerate the town and its Conservation Area, is being grant funded by Historic Environment Scotland (HES) and Aberdeenshire Council through the Banff Conservation Area Regeneration Scheme (CARS).

Over the next few months, traditional materials and working methods will be used to repair timber windows and doors, the roof, install new cast iron rainwater goods and reharl external walls with lime.

The Category-B listed Tolbooth is one of the five buildings identified as priority projects under CARS. In recent times, the upper floors have fallen out of use, whilst the ground floor retail premises continue as a takeaway, where improvement works were carried out through a former Townscape Heritage Initiative scheme in 2009.

Road resurfacing to start on M8 motorway

Road resurfacing work is to begin on the M8 motorway in Glasgow.

Scotland TranServ will start resurfacing 0.6kms of the M8 Eastbound between Anderston Cross and Bath Street from Friday, 25 May.

The project will be carried out over a series of overnight closures;

Aberdeen heritage-led projects secure £901,000 funding boost

More than £900,000 has been secured for heritage-led regeneration projects in Aberdeen.

A total of £901,000 in funding is being released through the City Heritage Trust programme, administered by Historic Environment Scotland (HES).

The award is part of an overall £8.6 million being invested across Scotland.

In partnership with HES, along with Aberdeen City Council and other groups, Aberdeen City Heritage Trust will deliver this funding through their own programmes to eligible local projects. The aim is to regenerate historic buildings and city precincts, provide training opportunities, create jobs, and lever additional funding from other sources.

Overall, grant funding will be made available to property owners to support improvements to granite buildings in areas like Bridge Street, Market Street and King Street, complementing work already taking place on Union Street.

Past funding has enabled Aberdeen City Heritage Trust to support significant transformative projects, including 49-53 Marischal Street where a C listed building on the Buildings at Risk Register was brought back into use as flats, and the B listed warehouse on York Place, which was transformed through significant repair and restoration work.

The funding is in addition to the £1.17m contributed by both Aberdeen City Council and Historic Environment Scotland and the £50,000 contributed by Aberdeen inspired to the Union Street Conservation Area Regeneration Scheme, which was launched in November last year and runs until 2022.

Plans lodged to turn Aberdeen store into restaurant

Plans have been launched to turn a former Aberdeen electrical shop into a family restaurant.

If approved the Maplin store at the Haudagain Retail Park would be changed into an eatery.