More Focus – Page 104
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FeaturesUniversity challenge
With contractors more choosy about the projects they bid for, and inflation eroding HE’s fixed tuition fee income, can universities remain attractive to the industry?
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FeaturesThe Plimsoll Building: Close encounters
The incorporation of two schools into a residential building is an example of school designers becoming more responsive to the changing physical and political environment
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FeaturesTracker: July 2015
The construction activity index took a leap upwards after contraction the month before, while the UK composite index saw its largest increase since 2012
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FeaturesCrossing the line
With the Calais crisis still a hot media topic, the government is on the warpath against construction companies employing illegal workers. But is the sector doing enough to make sure it doesn’t get caught out?
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FeaturesA day at the office: Your guide to human happiness
How can you use design to actively influence and improve people’s lives? British Land is using its own headquarters as a test bed for incorporating wellbeing principles that it hopes will foster a happier, more productive workforce.
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FeaturesMarket review: Regaining momentum
July saw construction activity levels pick up, in a reflection of the wider economy during the spring months
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FeaturesCost update Q2 2015
Materials cost inflation falls again but construction weekly earnings continue to outperform those of the wider economy
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FeaturesWhat to specify: Residential
This week’s residential products include timber sliding sash windows for Alain de Botton’s A House in Essex project, and an external wall insulation that better suits the Georgian and Victorian brickwork often found in northern cities
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FeaturesInterview: Geeta Nanda
With government policies that cut rents and extend Right to Buy, housing associations are feeling the strain. But Geeta Nanda of Thames Valley Housing has an alternative approach
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FeaturesClass of 2014: One year later
Building catches up with the class of 2014 to find out if, having made it through their first year, life in construction is all they’d hoped it would be
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FeaturesWilmcote House: Thermal vision
The flaws of Portsmouth’s Wilmcote House may have been indicative of 1960s social housing, but now its mass adoption of Passivhaus principles could see it used as a model for sustainable retrofit
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FeaturesProcurement update: BIM
As the 2016 deadline for the UK government’s mandate gets closer, the take-up of BIM on projects and programmes is accelerating
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FeaturesThe Green Deal: 'A catastrophe from start to finish'
It’s been called the greatest flop of the last parliament. But why did the Green Deal, the government’s flagship retrofit scheme, fail so spectacularly?
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FeaturesHeathrow: Growing Pains
As Heathrow’s controversial third runway tries to chart a route through the political turbulence ahead, does it have anything to learn from its expanded international rivals?
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FeaturesApprenticeships levy: Taxing Times
The government’s pledge to deliver 3 million apprenticeships through a levy on large employers has left many in the industry confused as to how the policy will work
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FeaturesCost model: Higher education refurb
When UCL’s Bartlett School of Architecture outgrew its building a decision was needed on whether to demolish and rebuild, or radically refurbish it. The latter course was chosen
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FeaturesInterview: Brandon Lewis
Building talks to housing minister Brandon Lewis about the Conservative government’s radical policy agenda
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FeaturesFrom the archives in 1995
In 1995 getting a break from the office seemed more trouble than it was worth
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FeaturesTracker: June 2015
Orders continue to rise sharply across each sector, making the overall construction activity index’s drop into negative territory for the first time in almost three years a nasty surprise. Experian Economics reports