CIOB News

Chris Blythe Country estates hold key to social housing

CIOB backs new industry websites

The CIOB has given its backing to two new industry websites. It will provide funding and

direct members to designingbuildings.co.uk, a Wikipedia-style collection of articles written by readers about the process of designing and developing buildings. The CIOB may also provide articles. The CIOB is one of four

organisations that will contribute cash to cover the site's running costs for a year, which include editors and moderators to deal with articles and comments. The others are Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners, Buro Happold, and Development Securities. David Trench, chairman of Designing Buildings Wiki, said he hopes to get eight sponsors to contribute a total of £50,000. Trench added that he hoped the site, which launched in June, would allow the different disciplines of the building industry to become more collaborative. He said: "The CIOB, with its unequalled body of knowledge and wide membership, is a welcome new supporter of the site. Together we hope to make the industry less fragmented, better integrated, more efficient and more innovative." The CIOB is also sponsoring the

A recent report by the think tank Policy Exchange suggested selling off the most valuable council houses and reinvesting the money in building new units. Sell one property for £1m and build three in its place. As the housing minister Grant Shapps said, it’s “blindingly obvious”. I would not disagree. But there is something else which is also blindingly obvious too. My “hobby” gives me an opportunity

The CIOB is contributing to www.designingbuildings. co.uk (right) and sponsoring www.supplychainschool.co.uk (above)

“ The CIOB, with its unequalled body of knowledge and wide membership, is a welcome new supporter of the site.” David Trench, Designing Buildings Wiki

Supply Chain Sustainability School which provides tailored, online sustainability advice at www. supplychainschool.co.uk. The school, founded by Skanska, Kier, Lend Lease, Morgan Sindall, Sir Robert McAlpine, Willmott Dixon and Aggregate Industries, also holds workshops and training days for suppliers. Emma-Jane Allen, senior project manager at Action Sustainability, a partner in the project, said the CIOB would promote it to members.

QR codes set to present Institute's 'friendly' face According to CIOB event co-

The CIOB is embracing QR code technology, and will print the digital code on every subscription renewal pack sent out in this year's renewal campaign, plus all new membership cards issued from November this year. Anyone scanning the code on a smartphone or tablet device will be taken to the landing page for a specially-devised section of the CIOB website. Content will change regularly and will include access to the CIOB's “About us” video, as well as the monthly e-newsletter.

ordinator Alison Clayton, the initiative is seen as both “an information tool for existing members and a way of interesting new members”. “For members, who are the ones carrying the cards, it's a prompt to keep up to date with the CIOB world. Or if they're with someone who's interested in the CIOB, it's a way to enter a 'friendly' area of the website,” she explained. Everyone who renews their subscription by the end of

8 | SEPTEMBER 2012 | CONSTRUCTION MANAGER

of a bird’s eye view of the countryside every weekend. As a flying instructor I get a fantastic view of the landscape and to see it change month by month as the seasons pass is a real privilege. The most consistent comment I get when I take anyone up on a trial lesson is how green everywhere is. There is genuine surprise at the sheer amount of countryside. Like most of us they have been conditioned into believing that the countryside has been built over and there is precious little left and so we must protect what’s left. As we bimble slowly over the

countryside you do get a cracking view of what’s going on. Suburbia is full of swimming pools. A bit further out there are small estates, with a pool and a tennis court, sometimes in a small wood. Then there are the big estates ranging from country houses to stately homes where the land attached dwarfs the big house. It’s without doubt the stately homes

December will receive a new-style membership card. The initiative, which has been

taken forward by CIOB chief executive Chris Blythe, follows a successful taster project at the CIOB BIM conference in Dublin in June. The event flyer included a QR code, and Clayton says the experiment was “quite a success”. “Not everyone has a smartphone, but they are becoming widespread and we want to reflect the technology our members are using,” she said.

and country estates which draw most comment. They represent a considerable amount of development in the past and are at the heart of rural England. Their current owners and operators were some of the most vocal opponents of the Coalition’s changes in the planning laws and used a fair bit of arm twisting to blunt the proposals. It always struck me that the originators of these grand estates never had to contend with planning laws in the first place. The aim was to show off and out-do the duke or earl down the road. Any opposition was limited. There is a certain amount of irony

that democratic processes are being used to preserve places which were the antithesis of democracy when built. So let’s get back to the blindingly

obvious. Why not take a few acres of land from all these estates to expand the potential for social housing, especially in the countryside where all agree that low-cost housing is desperately needed? At the same time let’s give up a small amount of green belt in the suburbs. This is better than selling off school playing fields. In truth you would not notice any difference, believe me.