LONDON’S GLOBAL UNIVERSITY
Investing £1.25b on refurbishing and reinventing our campus. Estates 2018–19
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The Transforming UCL Masterplan Since 2014, UCL has been delivering an extensive building and refurbishment programme – Transforming UCL. This is about creating sustainable spaces that meet UCL’s world-class aspirations and commitment to excellence and innovation. We’re investing more money than ever before to provide new facilities that match our global ambitions, and to ensure that our original estate is fit for the 21st century and beyond. Transforming UCL is the largest capital programme in the university’s history. It will see substantial investment of more than £1.25 billion over the next 10 years to refurbish and develop some of our most iconic buildings, whilst also bringing forward new world-class buildings. Together these will enable and support the university’s continued growth as we continue to build now and for the future.
We’re working on spaces for study, research, teaching, events and much more.
We are working hard to increase the sustainability of the UCL campus.
We’re celebrating the four-year milestone into our £1.25b, 10-year programme to refurbish and develop some of our most iconic buildings, whilst also bringing forward new 3
Transforming UCL Timeline The first phase of the Capital Programme is well underway. Here’s a sample of completed projects and some major projects coming in the next few years.
South Quad Teaching Hub completion
2014
CBER 2 (Medawar Building) completion
2016 Sainsbury Wellcome Centre completion
Chenies Mews Construction Welfare completion
School of Management, Canary Wharf
Roberts Building completion
Insititute of Education 4th and 5th Floor Works completion
2015
Charles Bell House completion Main Quad ‘pop-up’ opens
2017
Kathleen Lonsdale Building completion
Medical Sciences completion 22 Gordon Street completion
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Confucius Institute completion
Brownstone Laboratory completion
Cruciform Hub completion
Russell Square House completion
Wilkins Terrace / Lower Refectory completion
1–19 Torrington Restack completion
2021
2018 Interim Dementia Research Institute completion
First UCL East building to open (Pool Street West)
Bloomsbury Theatre completion
1–19 Torrington Place Data Centre completion
2022
Student Centre completion Bentham House (Laws) completion
Here East completion
Second UCL East building to open (Marshgate I) 2024
2019
Astor College completion
Institute of Neurology & Dementia Research Institute completion
Courtauld completion
Institute of Education Phase 1A completion
Institute of Education Phase 2 completion
Pears Building Institute of Immunity &
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Completed projects
The Sainsbury Wellcome Centre
Cruciform Hub
Roberts Building
The Sainsbury Wellcome Centre for Neural Circuits & Behaviour brings together world-leading scientists to investigate how brain circuits process information to create the neural representations that guide behaviour.
UCL allocated funding to improve the underground links to the Rockefeller Building and Medical School and to convert the Cruciform Library into a Medical Hub, incorporating project learning space, suited to the new MBBS 2012 programme.
A range of works took place in the Roberts Building, providing a package of improvements from ongoing hygiene works to the refurbishment of teaching spaces within the building in rooms 508, 409, 422, 421.
Brownstone Laboratory
Medical Sciences
This lab has developed preparations and methodologies to study neural circuits in the brain stem and spinal cord and their role(s) in motor behaviours.
We have delivered the refurbishment of a number of offices and labs in the basement level of the Anatomy and Medical Sciences building, to create a world-class, high throughput cell imaging and screen laboratory.
Construction Welfare Building at Chenies Mews
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Provision of high quality welfare and office accommodation reinforces UCL’s approach to site safety and the safety of our students, staff and visitors.
South Quad Teaching Hub This temporary facility includes a 100 person lecture theatre, which can also be used as an events space on the ground floor. There are three additional seminar rooms upstairs.
Medawar Building Existing laboratories in this building have been transformed and opened up to create a new office and research centre for the new Centre for Biodiversity & Environment Research.
Russell Square House We've renovated this site, which is home to research departments for Brain Repair & Rehabilitation, Neurodegenerative Disease, Neuroinflammation, the UK Dementia Research Institute Hub and the Max Planck UCL Centre for Computational Psychiatry & Ageing Research.
In the four years since the start of the current Capital Programme (August 2014), 95 projects have been completed across the estate. 7
Future Projects UCL East
Institute of Neurology and Dementia Research Institute Completion date: 2024 UCL’s Institute of Neurology and Dementia Research Institute will become a new hub for UCL neuroscience – one of the leading translational neuroscience centres in the world. The new facility will be purpose-designed to be both sustainable and reconfigurable over the building’s lifetime to respect future developments in this
Pears Building Institute of Immunity & Transplantation (IIT) Completion date: 2020 The IIT will be one of five leading centres of its kind around the world, bringing scientists and clinicians together to research revolutionary 8
UCL is expanding to give us the land and space that we urgently need to pursue our academic ideas, both now and for many generations to come. Our new campus will complement the Bloomsbury campus and make its home on the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. In the first phase, we will create two buildings, providing around 50,000m2 of development and around 500 bed spaces for student accommodation. Our buildings will provide an outstanding environment for learning and scholarship for students, staff, collaborators and the public. There will be teaching spaces, workshops, laboratories, exhibition and community spaces, and retail uses. There will be around 50 new or nearly-new programmes for undergraduates, postgraduates and pre-degree level students in UCL East Phase One. The first building, Pool Street West, will open in autumn 2021. It will house the Future Living Institute, as well as providing student accommodation.
The Future Living Institute will be a multi-disciplinary home for researchers from at least five faculties to look at the past, present and future of living, both locally and internationally. Much larger than Pool Street West, and with a phased opening from autumn 2022, our second building, Marshgate I, will serve as the centre for the UCL East academic vision. It will bring together activities across Experiments, Arts, Society and Technology (EAST). When fully operational, the first phase of UCL East will have approximately 4,000 students and approximately 260 academic staff on site, alongside other users and visitors.
A model of our new campus, based on the UCL East masterplan. The Phase 1 buildings are shown in the detailed wooden models.
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Teaching spaces
UCL Here East houses a new robotics-ready manufacturing facility.
A further 91 seat teaching room on the second floor of Central House has also been completed.
UCL Here East Project value: £13.2m Completion date: Nov 2017
Main Quad Teaching Space Project value: £2.5m Completion date: Dec 2017
Here East is the first UCL presence on the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. The space, approximately 100m in length, with a ceiling height of 10m, will be used to develop a centre for cross-disciplinary research and teaching.
Provision of a temporary teaching facility within the Main Quad, comprising of:
The facilities include a robot hall and ‘make-space’ capable of allowing work on full-scale components from the aviation and construction industries. Students will also be able to make use of labs and a studio space, and a ‘collabarotorium’ capable of seating up to 280 people. The Real Estate Institute will be based in UCL Here East. It will form part of a technological and innovative hub collaborating with a range of organisations to shape society of the future. As well as offering postgraduate taught and research programmes, the institute will provide executive education and short courses for professionals, and seek to form partnerships with organisations and individuals. 10
– Two 100 person lecture theatres – Two 50 person seminar rooms – A Slade School of Fine Art designed building wrap – Wooden ramped access with feature lighting
Torrington Place delivered 1,000m² of high-quality, fully accessible additional teaching space.
1–19 Torrington Place Project value: £10.1m Completion date: Jan 2018 Provision of the largest amount of highquality, centrally bookable teaching space on the Bloomsbury campus featuring: – A new communal welcome space in the lobby with cluster tables and soft seating in booths – Three lecture theatres with 120 person capacities – Seven new classrooms: two large 30+ capacity rooms and five smaller rooms with space for up to 20 people The project will address the need to provide excellent teaching and learning spaces for the growing UCL community that are inclusive and fully accessible with each room having significantly enhanced AV / IT facilities. The project also improved accessibility, with the installation of a new lift in the main entrance, and delivered new toilets, including gender neutral facilities.
In 2017–18, four major projects completed that increased our teaching spaces by 23%, delivering an additional 2,800 teaching seats. These include the Main Quad Pop Up, Central House, 1–19 Torrington Place, Bentham House and Institute of Education. 11
Study spaces UCL Library Services, ISD and Estates invested over £1 million to develop new learning spaces during 2016-17, following a large amount of funding approved by the Central Estates Strategy Board. 534 study spaces were opened during 2016-17 across UCL Library Services, mostly in the summer months. This brings the total number of study spaces managed by the library to 4,194. After the Student Centre opens in 2019, UCL’s provision of study spaces will be better than the Russell Group average.
Student Centre Project value: £67.4m Completion date: Early 2019 This six-storey project will provide 1,000 new study spaces, student enquiry services, a café, IT clusters and areas for both social and quiet study. It will also include a roof terrace and new ground floor landscaping and outside public space. The centre will be a benchmark of excellence for all future UCL development projects. The high-quality design is responsive to change with flexible spaces and integrated technology, and has been designed to utilise the latest sustainable technologies. The project is currently running ahead of schedule and within the approved budget, all whilst being sustainable; the project remains on track to achieve a BREEAM Outstanding rating.
The Student Centre will provide 1,000 new study seats, a hub for our student community, in the heart of UCL's prestigious central campus. 12
The Student Centre will have approximately 400m² of electric solar panels on the roof.
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Faculty spaces
This project provides approximately 3,000m² more floor area than the old Wates House.
22 Gordon Street – Bartlett School of Architecture Project value: £33m Completion date: Dec 2016 This was the first major project on the Bloomsbury campus to be completed and houses the Bartlett School of Architecture. It replaces Wates House, which was designed to house 380 students and 90 staff. The faculty now comprises more than 2,300 students in 13 sections, which operate across eight buildings. 22 Gordon Street provides double the amount of teaching and research space than Wates House did.
The Confucius Institute proves heritage building construction can be sustainable.
15 Woburn Square – Confucius Institute Project value: £1.7m Completion date: Jun 2017 15 Woburn Square is a terraced Georgian property that has been renovated to provide high-quality working spaces to support the work of the UCL Institute of Education Confucius Institute for Schools. Led by architects Hawkins\Brown, the project revitalised the former townhouse, reversing a series of unsympathetic modern interventions and restoring its heritage features to provide an elegant and practical new home for the institute.
The original building was in poor condition and did not meet environmental standards. The new building will help to facilitate the Bartlett’s continued aim of being a global leader within its field by providing a high-quality, low-energy environment for teaching, learning and research.
First acquired by the university in the 1950s and 60s, the interiors have suffered from years of use as offices, and the project team have been working to restore the building’s period features using traditional plasterwork and painting methods in accordance with requirements from heritage authorities.
22 Gordon Street has won the prestigious 2017 RIBA London Region Award.
In keeping with the local surroundings, and located at the heart of the UCL campus, each room has been thoughtfully and purposefully designed. This project has won the SKA Gold rating for sustainability.
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This sustainable project includes photovoltaic arrays, LED lighting, green roofs and more.
Bentham House – Faculty of Laws Project value: £24m Completion date: Mar 2018 Bentham House has been the home to the Faculty of Laws since 1965. It has recently undergone an extensive refurbishment and extension to provide over 700 modern flexible teaching seats, collaborative work spaces and a central hub for socialising and entertainment. The redevelopment will give all UCL Laws staff and students a modern and dynamic environment in which to further support and inspire the faculty’s world-leading research, award-winning teaching and innovative social enterprise projects.
The new Institute of Education will deliver 930 new teaching seats.
20 Bedford Way – Institute of Education – Phase 1 Project value: £20m Completion date: 2019 The IoE Masterplan is an opportunity to address legacy maintenance and repair issues at 20 Bedford Way whilst delivering much-needed modern, repurposed space for students, staff and visitors. The plan comprises four phases and Phase 1, which is on site, delivers: – 3,000m² + of refurbished space – 930 new teaching seats – New student social study space – Improved accessibility for building users
The new Bentham House created 1,500m² of new space for UCL's Faculty of Laws. This includes an increase of over 400 new study seats.
– Refitted office space in Wing A level 5 – BREEAM Excellent scheme
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Accommodation UCL accommodation has seen a significant refocus in recent years, with particular emphasis on improving both the student experience, as well as the quality of the physical assets. This focus on student experience has been a key deliverable for UCL accommodation and throughout the past two years, under new leadership, the Accommodation team has developed a fresh innovative approach to student experience and engagement which has and will continue to benefit those students living in UCL accommodation. Future improvements include the implementation of a 'Residential Life' programme, further enhancing the student experience delivered within accommodation. A major capital redevelopment of Astor College is underway and will open in 2019, providing bed spaces and enhanced facilities for students with disabilities in the Bloomsbury area.
Astor College Project value: £35.6m Completion date: Jan 2019 The refurbishment and extension of Astor College will provide space for 291 students with en-suite accommodation and fully accessible rooms for disabled students. New ‘cluster blocks’ encourage communal interaction amongst students in their first year to help build a strong and vibrant community. The hall will become more active for students and neighbours with recreational facilities on the ground floor, an integrated café opening out on to Charlotte Street and an improved public realm along Bedford Passage. The latest sustainable technologies such as a ‘BluRoof’ will improve drainage and water retention, and a shared control heating plant with the Sainsbury Wellcome Centre will reduce energy usage in both buildings.
In addition, major improvement opportunities are being explored for the accommodation estate.
The Astor College refurbishment and extension will house 291 students. 16
Astor will have recreational facilities on the ground floor, an integrated cafĂŠ opening out on to Charlotte Street and an improved public realm along Bedford Passage.
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Research facilities
The new Charles Bell House features provision for laser work, histology, imaging and engineering workshops.
The new Courtauld Building will create world class research laboratories.
Charles Bell House Project value: £17m Completion date: Nov 2017
Courtauld – Prion Unit Project value: £30.5m Completion date: Apr 2018
Charles Bell House is an Edwardian building that has undergone a full refurbishment to deliver a new institute for groundbreaking collaboration between UCL School of Life & Medical Sciences and the UCL Faculty of Engineering Sciences.
The Courtauld Building has been comprehensively remodelled internally to create a new home for the Medical Research Council’s (MRC) Prion Unit. The project creates world-class research laboratories in a refurbished building to support the ground breaking work conducted by the Prion Unit.
The refurbishment of Charles Bell House brings together for the first time researchers from the Division of Surgery & Interventional Science, the Centre for Medical Imaging and the Institute of Healthcare Engineering to develop their research in a collaborative manner within one building.
The new Charles Bell House offers 248 newly refurbished desk spaces. 18
This new research facility will help facilitate a partnership between UCL and the MRC that will advance understanding of the fundamental mechanisms of prion and other neurodegenerative diseases to find groundbreaking treatments for patients. The Courtauld Building had been unoccupied for almost 10 years, and has been remodelled to include new reception and office space areas, new teaching and flexible work space and new research laboratories.
The DRI will be catalytic in the UK’s research efforts to diagnose, treat, care for and prevent dementias.
Open plan offices providing new shared studio space, Hubs, and break out spaces.
Cruciform – Interim UK Dementia Research Institute Project value: £18.2m Completion date: 2018
Kathleen Lonsdale Building – Earth Sciences Project value: £28.6m Completion date: 2018
The UK DRI operates across six UK research centres, working together towards a shared vision. The hub of the research activities and operational headquarters is at UCL. The final £250m DRI Hub will be created within the EDH Redevelopment. However in the interim, the facility will be based in the Cruciform Building.
The Kathleen Lonsdale refurbishment project has allowed the Earth Sciences department to co-locate in one building with teaching spaces, research offices and high specification laboratories. Also accommodated within the project are other departments of the Faculty of Maths & Physical Sciences, including; the Astrophysics department, a new radiochemistry GMP suite, and existing Chemistry and Maths groups.
The first phase of the project was completed in December 2017 and the last two phases are planned to complete by May 2018. The DRI project is responsible for all enabling works required to relocate the current occupants of the Cruciform as well as refurbishment of the vacated areas.
The building energy consumption is greatly improved, with fabric upgrades to all windows, and walls where heritage consent has allowed. The building has adopted natural ventilation to all non technical spaces, greatly improving carbon reduction.
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Social and cultural spaces Wilkins Terrace / Lower Refectory Project value: £26.6m Completion date: Sept 2017
Bloomsbury Theatre Project value: £19.8m Completion date: Oct 2018
This project has created a new public open space in the heart of the Bloomsbury campus on the site of the former Physics Service Yard. Wilkins Terrace is a stunning events area providing space for learning, performances and exhibitions at UCL.
The Bloomsbury Theatre was opened in 1968 as a home for student and university produced theatre at UCL. The theatre was able to fulfil this purpose for close to 50 years, before it was closed in 2015 for essential maintenance work after a number of legacy issues began limiting the operation of the building.
Alongside the Lower Refectory project, it forms a new pedestrian route from Gower Street to Gordon Street, enabling pedestrians to flow through the campus from the Wilkins Building, past the Student Centre to the Bloomsbury Theatre Cafè. The terrace area will also allow access from this new seating area, via a new lift and dual stairway, to the Lower Refectory, revealing previously concealed spaces on the site. The terrace area is landscaped in a Portland Stone surface, ‘carved out’ to create a lower terrace alongside the Lower Refectory and an upper terrace off Wilkins North Cloisters.
The Wilkins Terrace and Lower Refectory are designed as inclusive central spaces, well purposed for events, social spaces and to welcome visitors and students. 20
A plan was agreed in early 2016 to refurbish the theatre auditorium, along with the backstage, workshop and front of house areas, to bring it up to a modern standard. The refurbishment will see: –T he total replacement and upgrading of the theatre’s technical infrastructure, bringing much of it from 1960s install to modern-day standards. – A new auditorium featuring improved stage lighting and audio visual systems to enhance performances and give performers the ability to customise the theatre and studio. – Better acoustics in the auditorium improved through new insulation. – For the first time, cooling will be provided.
The Wilkins Terrace delivers flexible outdoor space at the heart of our Bloomsbury campus.
The Bloomsbury Theatre was opened in 1968 as a home for student and university produced theatre at UCL, but has been closed since 2015.
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Accessibility Creating a sustainable estate is not just about reducing the environmental impact of our buildings. Optimising access, inclusion and the health and wellbeing of staff and students is also a huge part of our sustainable mission. Our heritage estate presents many design challenges – such as small spaces, narrow doorways, lack of accessible toilets and circulation spaces, and steps between levels and at entrances, exits and thresholds. Though adaptations such as lift access, ramps and handrails can all help, it is much harder to achieve accessibility in historic spaces not originally designed with this in mind.
The Transforming UCL programme will seek to rebalance this, transforming the estate through new modern user-designed buildings, into one that is inclusive and accessible. More specifically the priority to make our buildings more accessible so that they welcome and include everyone. Completed projects which have improved accessibility and inclusion on the estate have included: 22 Gordon Street (The Bartlett), The Wilkins Terrace and Lower Refectory and 1–19 Torrington Place, our largest accessible centrally bookable teaching space. The Bloomsbury Theatre, due to complete construction in Autumn 2018, will include improved accessibility for audiences and performers.
We’re increasing our number of gender neutral toilets with every refurbishment. 22
1-19 Torrington Place improved accessibility, with the installation of a new lift in the Main Entrance, and new toilets, including gender neutral facilities.
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Highlights of the last year What we’ve achieved – Overall, 11 major projects (with a value over £10m) were completed by the end of this financial year – Capital Programme cumulative spend to end of year 4 is around £560m, £213m this year – The Student Centre in Bloomsbury is ahead of schedule and on budget, due to complete early 2019 – The impact of HS2 has been fully mitigated, including relocating our datacentre and 950 staff – We secured outline planning for our UCL East campus, along with £100 million of funding from Government – The acquisition of the Eastman Dental Hospital has been agreed and a revised IoN / DRI project has been confirmed – A new Estate Strategy is being developed – Strategic Maintenance Programme record spend to deliver legally compliant and improved estate condition – but still not enough – We’re on track to reduce our carbon emissions by 15% by 2020, helping us win a People and Planet Green League first class rating – 23% increase in teaching space as well as system improvements to room bookings, timetabling and use of intelligent data for space management 24
In the four years since the start of the current capital programme (August 2014) 95 projects have completed across the estate.
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Total investments We’re spending £1.25 billion over ten years as part of the Transforming UCL project to create new, sustainable spaces and facilities to meet our worldclass aspirations and commitment to excellence and innovation. Philanthropy has always played a key part in the transformation of UCL. The first public reference to a proposed ‘London University’ was published on 9 February 1825. Just seven months later, a £30,000 donation had acquired our first eight acres of Bloomsbury land. That momentum of expansion and improvement in our estate has been supported by charitable giving ever since. Around 10% of the £1.25 billion Transforming UCL spend will come from fundraising. We now have over 95 projects completed in total. Programme expenditure to end of Year 4 is around £560 million.
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Estates Capital Programme Expenditure Year
10yr plan
14 / 15
£81,500,000
Actual
15 / 16
£95,400,000
Actual
16 / 17
£169,300,000
Actual
17 / 18
£213,100,000*
Actual
Total
£559,300,000
* Note: Includes £108,000,000 land acquisition.
It's All Academic, The Campaign for UCL, is raising substantial funds for capital projects
We're aiming to create sustainable spaces that meet UCL’s world-class aspirations and commitment to excellence and innovation.
University College London Gower Street London WC1E 6BT +44 (0)20 7679 2000 ucl.ac.uk/transforming-ucl