Guest article from Joe Malone BSc(Hons) ICIOB
'I would state that the key to success lies in adopting a holistic design process. We simplify future building and estate management by broadening our understanding beyond the technical requirements of building refurbishment'.
Group Investment Programme Manager - WM Housing Group
Organizations’ as large as WM Housing Group spend a great deal of capital investment on improving their housing stock and understandably are committed to maximizing the returns on that investment. As Group Investment Programme Manager I am responsible for delivering circa £25m of planned investment work this financial year and understandably have a great deal of responsibility in ensuring that the money is invested wisely. How to invest wisely is a subject in itself but I have always firmly believed that the real key to protecting the investment lies in adopting a socio-physical approach; that is to say, we absolutely have to understand the social problems on our estates or the physical improvements will most likely be torn down before the defects liability period expires. Take 'Thomas King House' for example; a typical 1960's sixteen storey concrete tower block in the Hillfields area of Coventry; for those of you that don't know Coventry, it's fair to say that this was one of the most deprived and neglected areas of Coventry. Twelve months ago, Thomas King House was not of the standard we strive for and it was a block with a great deal of social problems illustrated by a high turnover in tenancies and a high vacancy level. It was clear from consultation with residents that they did not feel safe and securely housed in this block and it was critical to address those concerns through the £3.5m block refurbishment that was completed in June 2012. The finished results are stunning and I firmly believe that Thomas King House will serve as an exemplar in high-rise refurbishment not just for WM Housing Group but also for other registered providers. So having said all that... what has WM Housing done that is so different and how does it protect the £3.5m investment?
As indicated earlier, we adopted a two-pronged attack to deal with the social and physical factors. In terms of the social issues surrounding high-rise blocks, I am a great fan of Oscar Newman's 'Defensible Space' theory ever since reading his landmark book. Oscar Newman was a New York City planner who developed his theory of social control and crime prevention around high-rise blocks in the early 1970's. Though often confined to history the basic principles still hold as good now as they always did and I wrote the work specification for Thomas king House with those principles very much in mind. In the 1970's America was decades ahead of the UK in terms of high rise developments, and Newman in particular, understood the reasons for high crime levels around high rise blocks and formulated his own design guidelines for creating defensible space. There are five basic principles for creating defensible space and whilst I could not adopt them all, I did adopt the principles that could pragmatically be applied to Thomas King House; they were...
1. 'The territorial definition of space in residential developments to reflect the zone of influence of specific inhabitants.' In real terms, this meant clearly defining the hierarchy of space to define public, semi public and private areas. Externally we have used a combination of fencing, landscaping and colored paving to ensure the external public and semi public areas are clearly defined. There are gates to access the area to the front entrance foyer; these are not locked but the intention is to create a psychological rather than physical barrier. We have also created a private landscaped garden to the front of the block to heighten the sense of resident ownership and pride in where they live because if you can give residents pride in their homes then you create a watchful environment. Creating this sense of territorialism is a key principle.
2. Image, or the capacity of the physical design to impart a sense of security. The design of the entrance plaza and in particular the new entrance foyer and access control system was crucial in achieving this aim. I designed the entrance foyer to incorporate two doors with electronic locks and the foyer is large enough to catch 'tailgaters' on camera before they can tailgate through the second locked door. Additional cameras all linked back to a central control room have further heightened the sense of security as has the installation of a barrier controlled car park. One aspect of the physical design often forgotten is the choice of materials or maybe it is more appropriate to state that material choices are often ill conceived. What immediately strikes you on visiting Thomas King House is that this is not your typical social housing refurbishment, it looks like a high-end private refurbishment project and the material choices were deliberately made to achieve that outcome. There is a view that you must choose unbreakable materials on our toughest estates and these are seen as sensible choices based on pragmatic experience. The problem with this approach is that design and aesthetics are only a secondary consideration, if in fact considered at all. Forget the aesthetics and you can forget creating a sense of pride. The other issue is that we now know that if you install something for no other reason than it is 'indestructible' then I'll guarantee there will be someone who comes along to test the claim, usually with great success.
Moving on from defensible space, the physical improvements to the block are more obvious and again we focused on maximizing the quality of fittings and improving the layouts to individual flats. All 128 flats and communal areas were fully refurbished. I will not go into all the technical challenges in delivering a high-rise refurbishment; there are many, but I believe there is no point in physically improving our buildings unless we improve the surrounding estate. The estate improvement work around Thomas king House and its neighbouring block, Hillfields House, have further raised the bar and given residents a sense of pride in where they live. The external landscaping and private garden at Thomas King House added circa £20k onto the total project cost and even on a £3.5m project, there are many organizations that would ignore these finishing touches arguing that with £20k they could carry out more property improvements elsewhere. This is an incredibly short sighted view because the sense or ownership and pride created in lifting estates to this standard is what really protects the investment in the building fabric and reduces ongoing maintenance costs; crucially, the investment is protected by the residents themselves.
Post delivery we can discuss housing management’s role in protecting the investment and they absolutely have a part to play but as a Building Surveyor and practitioner, I would state that the key to success lies in adopting a holistic design process. We simplify future building and estate management by broadening our understanding beyond the technical requirements of building refurbishment.
Follow this link to view before and after pictures that will add some context to this article:
Joe Malone BSc(Hons) ICIOB
Group Investment Programme Manager
Information/opinions posted on this site are the personal views of the author and should not be relied upon by any person or any third party without first seeking further professional advice. Also, please scroll down and read the copyright notice at the end of the blog.
Organizations’ as large as WM Housing Group spend a great deal of capital investment on improving their housing stock and understandably are committed to maximizing the returns on that investment. As Group Investment Programme Manager I am commercial interiors
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