The latest integrated medical and leisure centre designed and
built by an award-winning team featuring BSP Consulting has opened
its doors.
The £15 million Moor Park Health and Leisure Centre
development in Blackpool features an eco-friendly drainage system
which has been incorporated into the play area and park around the
scheme. It is thought to be the first sustainable urban drainage
scheme (SuDS) in the country designed to be part of a play
area.
Civil and structural engineering company BSP Consulting, of
Pride Park, Derby, worked in association with Ashby de la Zouch
developer LSP Developments and Tamworth architects West Hart
Partnership Ltd on the Blackpool centre, a three-storey development
that includes three GP surgeries, PCT outpatient services, as well
as a library, gym and swimming pool.
The team previously worked together on a similar scheme at
Freshney Green, Grimsby, which last year won the HealthInvestor
Property of the Year Award.
"The scheme at the Blackpool development is particularly unusual
because it contains no underground surface water drainage, so all
the surface water run-off from roofs and hard-standing areas is
managed above ground through a combination of ponds and ditches
which take the water away from the building and allows it to
dissipate into the park area beyond," said structural engineer Paul
Whittingham, BSP's project manager for the scheme.
"Managing surface water run-off is critical to any development,
and we are delighted to have been involved in what we believe is
the first SuDs scheme that's been integrated as part of the design
of a play area and park."
The SuDS scheme was designed by landscape architect Dave
Singleton.
BSP Consulting, which also has offices in Nottingham, Leicester
and Sheffield, provides a comprehensive range of consultancy
services to all sectors of the construction community, from
architects, project managers and contractors to developers and
estate agents.