Agenda item

Report of the City Surveyor.

The Chairman introduced a report of the City Surveyor on the Additional Works Programme (AWP), noting that the works for 2015/16 had been fully funded. He added that whilst AWP projects had been fully funded for the past few years, this would not necessarily always be the case in future years. The Assistant Director added that the 2016/17 AWP proposals featured 99 projects on the Heath totaling £1.4m. These proposals would require the approval of the City Corporation’s Corporate Asset Sub (Finance) Committee at its meeting in July 2015 before final approval granted by the City Corporation’s Resource Allocation Sub (Policy and Resources) Committee at the end of 2015. The 2016/17 tranche of works were planned for a three-year cycle, with 60% of the projects taking place in the first year.

The Chairman noted that he had received notice of a question from Dr Gaye Henson, who had submitted her apologies for the meeting. Dr Henson queried why £50,000 had been allocated to the paddling pool. This amount seemed unnecessarily high, more so given doubts over its long term future. The Assistant Director replied that the costs were indicative only, and the provision for the paddling pool was made in the absence of any firm decision on its future simply to ensure the capacity existed to ensure it could be brought up to standard if need be. Should a decision be made that meant the £50,000 was not needed, this could be reinvested in other AWP projects.

Colin Gregory noted that it was difficult for the Consultative Committee to give guidance over how to prioritise the proposed projects given there was little context with which to judge the relative importance of each project.

Jeremy Wright noted the proposed £250,000 budget for the resurfacing of the Parliament Hill Athletics Track, and queried when the track had been last resurfaced and at what cost. Richard Sumray further queried to what standard the track would be resurfaced. The Operational Services Manager replied that the track had been last resurfaced a decade ago at a similar cost, and that a track specialist would be employed to bring the track up to the required AAA standard.