Windrush Square, Brixton - news and discussion

[Crispy]

How much does this sort of thing usually cost?

A "staggering", "ludicrous", "wasteful" or "criminal" amount of money depending on the reactionary tendencies of the estimator.

 

[teuchter]

Hey Teuchter, can you think of any other uses for that near £10 million that may pay greater dividends in Brixton, or is that beyond the scope of this artificially limited, slightly snide thread?

You seem to be constantly evading this point see.

It depends what the £10M actually paid for, as I keep repeating. Did it pay for just the square, or did it pay for all the road/street improvements that have been going on in central Brixton for the last couple of years? If it paid for the road improvements, was there roadwork stuff that needed to happen anyway? If there was, how much would it have cost if this scheme hadn't happened?

And what other ways could £10M be spent, and how do you make an objective comparison? The BCA is due to cost £6.3M but how much will it cost to run per year from then on, and how would this compare to the per year cost of maintenance of the Brixton centre public spaces, and what would its lifespan be before requiring renovation and again how would this compare to Windrush Square and associated work? How does it compare to the £25M of public money for the Evelyn Grace Academy and again what are lifespan costs and anyway how do you try and compare the benefit of improved public space for tens of thousands of people compared to a new school that will benefit a couple of thousand?

I don't know how to answer those questions really, and I don't think many people do, even people that make the decisions about allocating funding. A lot of it comes down to how loudly various parties shout and stuff like that, doesn't it? There are all sorts of examples where varying monetary values are attributed to things in an irrational way.

I'd say that if you're going to try and judge whether something like this is "good value for money" you should at least make, as a starting point, some sort of comparison to similar stuff done elsewhere. Only then (assuming this test does indeed indicate that it's been overly expensive) can you start to look at why - whether it's the brief, spec, design, procurement, construction or whatever that's at fault.

But before you even get to that point, you have to be clear what the thing actually cost in the first place, don't you? That's hardly a controversial statement.

 

[Gixxer1000]

Heres 750k worth of square;

http://www.architecture.com/UseAnAr...sNew/Landscaping/LyricSquare/LyricSquare.aspx

 

[Crispy]

same designers too

 

[teuchter]

Heres 750k worth of square;

http://www.architecture.com/UseAnAr...sNew/Landscaping/LyricSquare/LyricSquare.aspx

Or, £1.7 million, depending who you ask.

 

[Gixxer1000]

Well £6m gets you this!
http://www.bdonline.co.uk/news/six-shortlisted-for-£6m-king’s-cross-square/3132451.article

The 7,000sq m King’s Cross Square, which will be bigger than Leicester Square!!!!!

 

[Gixxer1000]

Dont know it but 500k gets you St Johns Sq Clerkenwell

 

[Crispy]

Or, £1.7 million, depending who you ask.

that project appears to be a simple repaving and addition of furniture. Which might lead one to suspect that the majority of the supposed £9.7m budget for windrush square went on the associated roadworks and infrastructure

 

[teuchter]

From google satellite view, Windrush Sq seems to be about 2.5 x the area of the Hammersmith one. (That is not including the newly paved area of Effra Road, or the bit outside KFC.)


So scaling up based simply (and simplistically) on area, 750k would translate into £1.875M or if you prefer the £1.7M figure for Hammersmith, that would translate into £4.25M for Windrush Sq.

 

[teuchter]

Dont know it but 500k gets you St Johns Sq Clerkenwell

About 13% of the area of Windrush Square, again judged from Google.

So £500 >>> £4.14M.

It seems that somewhere around £4M might be the "going rate" for a square the size of Windrush square, if relatively simply paved.

 

[London_Calling]

Great maths, very sound reasoning!

*paging Mr Ed*

 

[Gixxer1000]

About 13% of the area of Windrush Square, again judged from Google.

So £500 >>> £4.14M.

It seems that somewhere around £4M might be the "going rate" for a square the size of Windrush square, if relatively simply paved.

Nope dosent work like that, try scaling down 61 acres of Granary Sq or even Kings Cross , remember the cost is front end heavy

 

[Gixxer1000]

Also remember the original quote, circa 6m, was for a larger Square anyway- it was to include closing off Effra road. (mourns watering down /loss of greenery of project)

"The proposal includes a glasshouse and winter garden packed with plants from Africa and the West Indies, which will be lit from within at night to create a giant shadow projection of the plants on the structure's outer skin."

 

[editor]

Great maths, very sound reasoning!

*paging Mr Ed*

Err, no. That's actually a wild, uneducated guess.

What am I being 'paged' for anyway?

 

[teuchter]

Nope dosent work like that, try scaling down 61 acres of Granary Sq or even Kings Cross

No need really, as the space in front of Kings Cross is actually not that much bigger than Windrush Square.

By my Google estimations, about 1.25 x the size.

£6M / 1.25 = £4.8M scaled-down cost for Windrush Square; presumably more if we are to believe the "front end loading" you talk about is significant.

 

[Gixxer1000]

No need really, as the space in front of Kings Cross is actually not that much bigger than Windrush Square.

Not yet it isnt but wait until the demolition of all that single storey nastiness is complete.

 

[teuchter]

Also remember the original quote, circa 6m, was for a larger Square anyway- it was to include closing off Effra road. (mourns watering down /loss of greenery of project)

If we include Effra Rd, then that probably takes it to something near enough the size of KX.


Both images same scale in case someone thinks I'm making it all up:

 

[teuchter]

Not yet it isnt but wait until the demolition of all that single storey nastiness is complete.

No, I am including for that.

I think you need to check your numbers a bit more carefully before posting.

 

[Gixxer1000]

No, I am including for that.

I think you need to check your numbers a bit more carefully before posting.

Post up the link of what scheme youre using.

 

[teuchter]

Err, no. That's actually a wild, uneducated guess.

We can't be doing with that kind of thing around here, can we!

Staggering!

 

[teuchter]

Post up the link of what scheme youre using.

The one you gave me

http://www.bdonline.co.uk/news/six-shortlisted-for-£6m-king’s-cross-square/3132451.article

 

[Crispy]

I have traced off the areas, discounting any roads.

The area on the left is 1.64x as large as the area on the right

 

[Gixxer1000]

Yeah show us the footprint of the new square. Maybe colour it in on your Google picture.

 

[Onket]

We can't be doing with that kind of thing around here, can we!

Staggering!

 

[teuchter]

.

 

[teuchter]

Obviously we can haggle forever exactly where you draw the line, but I struggle to see how a maximum cost of £1.5M for Windrush Square fits in with those numbers.

They seem to suggest something around £4 to 4.5M.

 

[rover07]

Obviously we can haggle forever exactly where you draw the line, but I struggle to see how a maximum cost of £1.5M for Windrush Square fits in with those numbers.

They seem to suggest something around £4 to 4.5M.

The others have buildings on. Windrush has none. So £2 - 2.5 million is probably about right.

 

[teuchter]

The others have buildings on.

 

[editor]

This notion that costs for entirely different redevelopments in entirely different areas all universally simplify down to a simple, one-size-fits-all calculation is really naive, you know.

I've posted up the official costings from the press release and I'm not really inclined to comment on teucher's completely wild guesses based on random Google images.

 

[London_Calling]

Windrush isn't flat either, it's got tiers and everything. Have those others?

Have they even got dinky lighting?