St Andrew’s URC - Redevelopment Update - October 2010

Some of you may have heard about Bob Alger and Marcus Dann participating in the survey of the spire by being taken up to the triangular windows near the top in the "cherry picker" that was being used to assist with access. The report has now been received and it confirms that there is significant damage that needs to be         addressed because of erosion of some stones and erosion of both the lime mortar used    originally and of some of the concrete mortar used in later repair work. What it also          confirmed was that the ironwork in place has corroded and that the tilt gets worse near the top. However our architect thinks that it may have been leaning virtually all its life so     leaning is not a panic problem just something that we need to deal with as soon as funds permit.

Five contractors were invited to tender and four did. All were for more that    estimated by our Quantity Surveyor (QS) in July and advised to the church meeting in August. One was close to those figures except for the cost of external   masonry work to the church but the others were all significantly higher. The  extra masonry cost is due to more stone needing replaced and because of a     provision for preliminaries that may be duplication. We have requested that the architect and QS work with the contractor to see what can be done with the    external stonework and church guttering costs to try and bring the costs back to the circa £300,000 figure I reported in August. By the time you read this, those negotiations should be completed and the contractor should be ready to come on site. We will also need a church meeting to formally approve what is agreed.

We have discussed contract timing and been assured that the external work should be possible by end March provided the weather is kind the internal work, primarily the Montpellier Hall, can be done in 16 working weeks from access in late November so we can plan on availability for use in the first weekend in April. We may wish to use it for a fund raising event or two before users resume hiring of it. Regrettably we will not be able to host Synod next March.

 While this is being written after the announcement of the spending review, I have not been able to trace any news on changes being planned or whether the scheme will be extended past 31 March 2011. Once I have guidance I will update you.

Apart from the expenditure side we are currently awaiting a response from our application to the Summerfield Trust for assistance towards the cost of the Hall repairs, which they will consider as it is for community use. We should know by mid November. In addition Ian Thomson and his team are busy planning a series of events that I would urge you to support and to invite your friends and neighbours’.

David Black