Glasgow’s 29 secondary schools were to be rebuilt or substantially upgraded over a two year period with an immediate investment of £220 million. It was part of a massive £1.2 billion (at today’s prices) city schools project under the government’s Public Finance Initiative - the biggest schools project of its kind in the UK.
These schools were developed within Project 2002 by an SPV (Special Purpose Vehicle) consisting of Miller Construction (Consult, design, construct, Hard FM and Lifecycle) and Amey (soft FM) and project funders.
The specification included providing internet access, via the preferred IT infrastructure provider and email addresses for all pupils, optimising departmental clustering, providing all weather sports pitches and positioning the social area of the school at its heart. In planning the space it was important to understand beneficial adjacencies and reduce travel time between lessons as a lot of these schools consisted of several buildings across a large site.
Eleven new secondary schools were built and 18 secondary schools were fully upgraded and refurbished, with many benefiting from major extensions. Additionally, a new primary and nursery school for Knightswood was built as part of the project.
The original brief provided by Glasgow City Council's advisors consisted of two new builds, six refurbishment and extensions and the remaining 21 schools refurbished only. Utilising detailed whole life analysis were able to offer 12 new-builds, extension and refurbishment to eight schools and refurbishment for the remaining nine schools in the estate.
All facilities on the estate benefit from having building management systems (BMS) that control LUX levels, and heat automatically, thereby maximising energy efficiencies by only being employed when required.