ICE Council today approved a full refurbishment of the ICE’s new offices at 8 Storeys Gate.
The Storeys Gate building in Westminster was purchased in 2009, with proceeds from the sale of former Thomas Telford office building at Heron Quay. Employees currently located in three separate buildings – Marsh Wall, IMechE in Birdcage Walk, and One Great George Street - will move into the new offices once they been refurbished.
The vision is to encourage cross-functional working and improve operational efficiency by moving the majority of ICE and TTL employees into one fit for purpose office.
Three schemes for the refurbishment were proposed in December 2009, ranging from the minimum requirement, costing £3.73M, to a more extensive scheme (Option 3) approved today, costed at £5.17M. Independent analysis found the full refurbishment presented the best financial case for long-term investment and would achieve nett benefit by year 3.
The refurbishment will be partly funded by a mortgage of £4m, the repayments of which will be covered by the rent paid by TTL for the new office space, and partly by the sale of other investments. This means the full refurbishment can be achieved at virtually no cost to the Institution or members.
Concerns were raised over whether the contingency included was adequate without a full building inspection. Hugh Ferguson said they had done as much as possible to satisfy themselves there is enough resource for contingency in the plan. David Hutchison said actually the building had undergone an extensive investigation, for an occupied building. He added that a Qualified Risk Analysis Schedule was performed as part of the initial feasibility study.
It was also raised that the issue needed to be effectively communicated to members to alleviate misperceptions about how the refurbishment would be funded. ICE president Paul Jowitt confirmed that this was an utmost priority.
He continued, saying the decision to proceed was not taken lightly but after full consideration it presented the best case. He stressed that the building purchase and developments were to be financed by the sale of investments and a mortgage, not by member subscriptions.