Scottish Gas, Waterfront Edinburgh, Centrica HQ, Granton, Foster & Partners
Scottish Gas Headquarters, UK
Centrica HQ, Granton for Waterfront Edinburgh
Scottish Gas Edinburgh
Scottish Gas HQ
Architect: Foster & Partners
Waterfront Edinburgh – Information
Address: 1 Waterfront Avenue, Edinburgh, EH5 1SG
Phone: 0131 344 6001
Centrica HQ: image after opening nov 2003
Scottish Gas topping out at the ForthQuarter site
Ken Shuttleworth of Foster & Partners addressed architects at a breakfast event on May 16 to talk about design values for the residential plots at the Scottish Gas site.
Scottish Gas HQ: image supplied by Secondsite
29 Apr 2003
Scottish Gas HQ Topping Out ceremony at SecondSite’s ForthQuarter site
The topping-out on 29 April of the new Scottish Gas HQ building at Granton in Edinburgh heralds a new era for the capital¹s burgeoning waterfront. The ongoing renaissance of the Granton area along Edinburgh¹s waterfront takes a significant step forward today with a topping-out ceremony for the new Scottish Gas Headquarters building.
The energy-efficient Scottish Gas building by award-winning architects Foster & Partners is the first structure to be built on the ForthQuarter site at Granton, owned by SecondSite Property Ltd. It is also the first newly-constructed office building on the Edinburgh waterfront.
The ceremony will be marked by Phil Kirby, Director and General Manager of SecondSite, and Steve Gorry, General Manager of Scottish Gas, attaching a commemorative plaque to the building before a party of invited guests.
The site¹s history as the home to Scotland¹s largest gasworks lives on today as the new home for Scottish Gas. Production ceased in the 1960s and the largest gasholder has been demolished.
Speaking at the topping-out event, SecondSite’s Phil Kirby paid tribute to the project’s construction team and said: “We are delivering a new Headquarters facility in which Scottish Gas can take considerable pride. The high standard of this new building will continue to be reflected in our overall development of this important site”.
Said Steve Gorry of Scottish Gas: “Our 1800 staff look forward to moving into this 21st century “state-of-the-art” building and we congratulate all involved in its development. “Scottish Gas are pleased to again record a first, this time being the first major company to move into this part of the Waterfront Regeneration area, building on our already substantial links with the local area.”
The completion of external construction work on the purpose-designed 10,000 sq m office building represents a key stepping stone in the long-term regeneration of the Granton area and will see Scottish Gas move from its Granton House office later this year once the building¹s interior works are completed.
It marks the further progress in the transformation of the 44.5 hectare ForthQuarter site, which is the biggest in the 340-acre waterfront area designated by the City Council and other agencies as the capital¹s largest-ever regeneration project.
Over the past five years, more than £20m has been invested in the site by SecondSite in preparing the land for an ambitious and innovative mix of uses which will include: … A new £30m campus for Telford College … 2,000 residential dwellings … 75,000 sq m of office and business space … A 10,500 sq m local retail centre, mixed commercial use and landscaped open space … A 10-mile tram route linking Granton with the centre of Edinburgh.
SecondSite Property Holdings: Formerly Lattice Property prior to its renaming following the merger of Lattice Group companies with National Grid to become National Grid Transco, SecondSite has considerable expertise in the redevelopment of brownfield land and its return to beneficial use. In the past five years, the company has returned more than 1,000 acres of UK land to productive use, with more than 190 completed remediation projects.
Recent major projects led by SecondSite include the development of two energy-efficient buildings at Leeds City Office Park totalling 175,000 sq ft and let to BT Cellnet; an award-winning new 52,000 sq ft Operations and Control Centre for Phoenix Natural Gas in Belfast, and other major office developments at Thames Valley Park and at Homer Road, Solihull.
Scottish Gas HQ – information received from Waterfront Edinburgh 29 Apr 2003
Waterfront Edinburgh declared “Commercial Development of the Year 2003/2004”
Waterfront Edinburgh Ltd has beaten off 50 developments throughout the UK to win the accolade of “Commercial Development of the Year 2003/2004”. This prestigious award has been given by the Directors of one of the UK’s leading business publications, Business Britain, to mark the fortieth birthday of the publication.
The Directors, Management and editorial team initially considered 50 developments, narrowed them down to 25 and then to a final short list of 10.
Chief Executive of Waterfront Edinburgh Ltd, Andrew Russell, said: “This is a tremendous accolade which has come right out of the blue.
“It is a great encouragement to know that the fruits of our efforts are beginning to be seen. It is one thing to win a competition after submitting lots of promotional material, entry forms and so on- we will always have to do this. But it is quite another thing, and much more rewarding, to receive an award as a result of genuine independent research. It makes us want to raise our game still further.”
Several criteria were used by the magazine during the assessment: investment opportunity, location, future vision, appropriateness of the development for their readers, mixed use of site, landscaping, aesthetics, cost effectiveness, health and safety issues and customer relations.
The ten developments which reached the final stage of the assessment were: Waterfront Edinburgh Ltd; The Portrack Interchange Business Park in Cleveland; Bull Crag in Northumberland; Orian Business Park in Tyne & Wear; Waterwells in Quedgeley in Gloucester; Royal Business Park in Royal Docks, London; Farnborough Business Park; Gooseholm Crescent, Dunbartonshire; Kings Mill, Kent; and The Bullring, Birmingham.
Key components of the Waterfront Edinburgh project include 340,000 sqm of office and business space; 27,000 sq m of general industrial space; over 6,500 new homes, some 15% of which will be affordable housing; the creation of two local centres with retail floor space; a tram link between Edinburgh’s waterfront at Granton and the City Centre; a new marina and leisure facilities; a further education college and primary school; and significant parkland and landscaping.
Several milestones have been achieved to date by Waterfront Edinburgh Ltd, for example the appointment of Farrans Construction Ltd as management contractors for the two major transport corridors through the site, and the announcement of the Places for People Group and The Burrell Company consortium as preferred developer for the Upper Strand, the Company’s first major 7-acre residential development of around 500 apartments. We also successfully negotiated a £7Million five-year revolving credit facility with the bank of Scotland.
The Company also led a private/public consortium to develop a transport solution for North Edinburgh. The work undertaken by the group led to the announcement in March 2003 by the Scottish Executive of £375Million to build the North Edinburgh Tram Loop, linking the North Edinburgh area to the City Centre, together with a spur line from Haymarket Station to the Airport.
On the land owned by SecondSite Properties, a new HQ building is being constructed for Scottish Gas and local further education establishment, Telford College, announced in November 2002 its intention to build a purpose-built campus which is due to be open in September.
In January 2003, Forth Property Developments announced that it had sold land at Granton Harbour to the Elphinstone Group to build 94 flats.
It is estimated that it will take some 15 years to complete the project by which time some 20,000 will live on the site and that up to 17,000 will work there.
Manny Sandhu (Managing Director) and Howard Forrington (Editor) of Business Britain will present the Award to the Waterfront Edinburgh team at their office at Madelvic House, Granton Park Avenue, Edinburgh at 9am on 9 May.
Scottish Gas HQ – information received from Waterfront Edinburgh 8 May 2003
Buildings adjacent to Scottish Gas include
Telford College by HOK Architects
Waterfront Madelvic Factory
Comments / photos for the Scottish Gas HQ – Centrica Edinburgh page welcome