ATTRACTIONS
Greener fi elds
The building is sensitively designed to sit lightly in its surroundings and could, if necessary, be removed leav- ing relatively little permanent impact on the landscape. This was achieved by con-
structing it on a concrete raft, which in turn sits on
an area of ‘fi ll’ with mini- mal cutting into the soil. The construction used slender steel columns, lightweight framed walls and semi-external spaces – allowing the foundation depths to be minimised. The building has a high
BREEAM rating (the industry standard assessment sys- tem for sustainable building design and construction), and is designed to max- imise energy effi ciency, minimise carbon emis- sions and pollution, and reduce water consumption.
Features include: An open loop ground source heating system; mixed-mode venti- lation – the building will be naturally ventilated if exter- nal conditions allow; and ‘grey water’ will be used for the bulk of water required at the visitor centre.
Although all these facilities were down in a dip, if you approached the site from the north or west they jarred against the landscape. As we did an overnight switch to the
new centre in December 2013, these facilities had to remain in place, but over the next six months they’ll be dis- mantled. By the summer, Stonehenge will once again be standing alone in its natural grassland.
What can visitors expect from the new centre? We’ve conceived the building as liter- ally a stopping off point on the way to the Stones, which now lie 2km away. It’s all about getting people to the Stones and vastly improving their understanding and experience of them and the surrounding landscape, which contains an extraordinary number of prehistoric monuments .
How does the centre improve visitors’ understanding of the Stones? We now have an interpretative exhi- bition about Stonehenge that people can visit either before or after they see the Stone Circle, or both. We will also be displaying Stonehenge artefacts, such as some of the tools used to build the monu- ment – on loan from nearby museums – at the site for the fi rst time.
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Some of the artefacts on display at the centre have been loaned to English Heritage by other museums
People visit Stonehenge with some basic questions about the Stones. How will you answer them? We’re setting out the latest knowledge in response to questions about who built the Stones and how they were built. We don’t have all the answers but there’s ongoing research about Stonehenge and we engaged a num- ber of leading academics to help us tell the story. Some of those archae-
Read Leisure Management online
leisuremanagement.co.uk/digital
ologists are featured in the exhibition itself, talking about the various theo- ries surrounding the ancient site.
Do you expect dwell times to increase? Visitors previously spent around 45 minutes to an hour at the site, and we expect that to increase to around two hours. That time could even be extended further when the weather is good, as visitors now have the option to either walk all the way to the Stones, or to start from a National Trust viewing point and walk the fi nal kilometre to them, passing other key ancient monuments on the way.
ISSUE 2 2014 © cybertrek 2014
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