Rationalising an estate and implementing a workplace strategy for Bury Council

Bury Civic Hub

Bury Council was exploring ways to rationalise its estate and implement its workplace strategy, either through a new build Civic Hub or through a major refurbishment and reconfiguration of its existing Town Hall.

We provided design and surveying services in support of this, providing feasibility options for two new build options. One was for a 50,000 ft2 office over two storeys and the other for 75,000 ft2 over three storeys. Both were proposed to be constructed above an existing three-storey car park in Bury.

Our feasibility proposals provided Bury Council with plans, sections and sketch visualisations for the exterior and interior, in addition to material palette and precedents to inform the design strategy. These included a large customer reception area, space for a ground floor café/bar and potential commercial lets, and a large space for Bury Council’s Cabinet to hold meetings in. Offices were proposed to be open plan with high density desks and breakout areas, and mixture of formal and informal meeting spaces.

For the Town Hall refurbishment option, we completed a condition survey of the building fabric and services. This established that building services installations needed to be replaced with new installations to provide the required lifespan and to enable required changes to the layout of the Town Hall.