From CRFCA Annual report 2013-14 I draw no conclusions from this report.
[quote]West Bridgford Air Cadet building
The new Air Cadet building in West Bridgford,
Nottinghamshire is a testimony to local collaboration.
East Midlands RFCA were approached 5 years ago
by West Bridgford Council who needed to develop the
town centre including using the existing ACF and ACO
site. After protracted discussions funding and a new site
were secured for the new 420m² building on a prominent
piece of land on a major road leading into Nottingham.
The £1.1m project built by JM Hoyes of Lincoln is due for
completion in November 2014 and will be the new home
for a Detachment of West Bridgford Army Cadet Force
and 209 (West Bridgford) Squadron ATC, each parading
in excess of 30 Cadets.[/quote]
60 cadets divided by £1,100,000 = £18,000 per cadet
It must be one hell of a building for seven figures.
You are clearly not expecting either the ACF or ATC to ever recruit any additional cadets. There previous HQ was a Spooner Hut that has lasted for 53 years!!
The Value for Money or ROI will be spread across a similar timescale I would imagine, as well as allowing for expansion. Over 30 years this then equates to £600 per cadet, assuming that cadet numbers are maintained at current levels
For a moment I thought that you were asking whether the RFCAs themselves were value for money, not giving a specific example of what they have done for us!
The RFCA actually communicates with landowners?!! Who knew!!!
At my last squadron they wouldn’t even talk to me for ten years, let alone the landowner (which was the MoD for the first five years). The land was eventually sold off and despite my increasing appeals, they resolutely refused to negotiate the retention of a parcel of land for our use and the establishment of a new Sqn HQ there. After the land was sold, the new owners kindly agreed to let us stay, though again, the RFCA failed to communicate with them, meaning that we were left with a massive bill for unpaid business rates, rent and utilities…
To cap it all, I later discovered that the RFCA Treasurer was none other than the chairman of the new landowner…
As for the round of ‘improvements’ to my current squadron… To accuse the RFCA of Spanish Practices would be grossly unfair to Spaniards.
I would suggest being careful about what people post about RFCAs…they do see this, and lots of their staff do actually work hard and try. They are just as frustrated as we are a lot of the time.
[quote=“the silverback” post=22362]From CRFCA Annual report 2013-14 I draw no conclusions from this report.
[quote]West Bridgford Air Cadet building
The new Air Cadet building in West Bridgford,
Nottinghamshire is a testimony to local collaboration.
East Midlands RFCA were approached 5 years ago
by West Bridgford Council who needed to develop the
town centre including using the existing ACF and ACO
site. After protracted discussions funding and a new site
were secured for the new 420m² building on a prominent
piece of land on a major road leading into Nottingham.
The £1.1m project built by JM Hoyes of Lincoln is due for
completion in November 2014 and will be the new home
for a Detachment of West Bridgford Army Cadet Force
and 209 (West Bridgford) Squadron ATC, each parading
in excess of 30 Cadets.[/quote]
60 cadets divided by £1,100,000 = £18,000 per cadet
It must be one hell of a building for seven figures.[/quote]
Looks nice
Not huge, but i imagine part of the cost will be the land purchase.
I was chatting to a bloke from the ACF (they seem to have a closer relationship with RFCA) a few years ago we were told that a new style hut would cost £300K, so this building is a relative steal at £1.1M. But I don’t envy the OC of the ATC unit as it seems everything, due to the ACF’s special relationdhip with RFCA, has to go through the county CEO. I’d stick with my hut and forgo a shiny joint HQ.
But it doesn’t take much to speak to squadrons. I’ve emailed and left umpteen messages for the local works officer and nothing.
I’ve put in works orders for things we aren’t expected to do ourselves and nothing.
As a current member at 209 I can finally say after 2 months of homelessness we have now moved in!
If anyone is interested in visiting to have a look around I am happy to send you an invitation to our opening event. (Obviously this will be after RFCA’s official opening. We only have 4/5 Cadets that are allowed to attend that one so we decided to have a second)
[quote=“Jade243” post=23276]As a current member at 209 I can finally say after 2 months of homelessness we have now moved in!
. We only have 4/5 Cadets that are allowed to attend
[attachment=203]WestBridgfordJointCadetTrainingCentre.jpg[/attachment][/quote]
That is crap. the building id for cadets they should be there on the opening of THEIR new building,
I don’t about Tesco it looks like our local library, mind you better than the shed look.
It looks nice externally but the internal configuration is everything. The current footprint for a HQ is 180m[sup]2[/sup] so at 420 that’s only another 40 per unit. You could lose that extra in entrance lobby and corridors.
I’ve seen a couple of these cadet centres and I’ve not been impressed. Some shared classrooms, individual offices and stores and the ACF seem to hold the decent cards in terms of getting things done as they deal direct with RFCA via the CAA with the ATC having to go through WHQ. It’s a bit like living with the in-laws, seems like a decent arrangement for about 5 minutes.
I know it’s a way of saving money but sometimes it’s better to have something to call your own, but we have no say.
I wish you well in your new HQ, but I don’t envy you at all, I’m quite happy with my shed, if it means I don’t have to share.
It is on Wilford Lane, on the main road so quite visible compared to the other unit. Next to the road that leads to Emmanuel School.
The entrance hall is massive compared to the rest of the building, lots of wasted space. Because of it being built on flood plains the use of ground space isn’t great and it goes diagonal, meaning no space for drill. (A shame as we used to have a massive car park)
We get on well with the ACF Staff, however the building can only accommodate 80 Cadets - we currently both parade on Thursday nights. It is a shame we no longer have our ‘own’ home and as people have said before, because RFCA get on better with the ACF they pretty much get things done, we have put plenty of requests in but have been told no to every one.
The classrooms are small, and we have the partition walls between two rooms. However the smart boards are in the wrong place and if you open up the walls they are hidden by them.
Overspend means we now have painted breezeblocks instead of plasterboard so it is very prison like which is a shame.
Parade hall is nice, but not massive (enough for one unit to have their final parade and then the second to have theirs afterwards)
Strangely they have decided to put the hot water boiler high enough for our OiC that is over 6 foot 4 on the wall, so us smaller people have to reach over head height! (We may just have to get the Boss making the drinks!)
I can’t claim to be a fan of that particular building nor the idea of sharing with the ACF but I suppose needs must.
We had a brand spanking new building just for us two years ago (or thereabouts) and whilst it took some getting used to compared to our previous 60 year old shed it’s very comfortable. I can’t claim to know how much it cost but I don’t think there was much change out of £300,000 (may be completely wrong).
I would say that the classrooms are too small and that the main hall is of rather odd proportions but we muddle by. One benefit is that we now have a wired network that the squadron computers run off because the wires can be routed above the ceiling tiles (no asbestos!) compared to the old building. We did however have to lose our two Link trainers (one in full working order) in the move which was a shame. Another oddity is the ramp at the front which means meandering your way up to the front door, I believe there were supposed to be stairs as well but they were never put in. The main building is sited some distance away from our portacabin which whilst annoying isn’t really a problem at all but we do use the portacabin a lot less than we used to which seems wasteful, one side has been turned over to storage when it could be a classroom.
Having visited other squadron HQs in the wing I know just how lucky we are to have what we do, but maybe the money could have been used more wisely?
[quote=“Jade243” post=23276]As a current member at 209 I can finally say after 2 months of homelessness we have now moved in!
If anyone is interested in visiting to have a look around I am happy to send you an invitation to our opening event. (Obviously this will be after RFCA’s official opening. We only have 4/5 Cadets that are allowed to attend that one so we decided to have a second)
[attachment=203]WestBridgfordJointCadetTrainingCentre.jpg[/attachment][/quote]As an ACF Det Commander going through the same RFCA prevarications and nonsense prior to rebuilding a cadet centre with us and the sea cadets, I would be interested in a visit. Where is West Bridgford?
[quote=“MRAR” post=23316]I can’t claim to be a fan of that particular building nor the idea of sharing with the ACF but I suppose needs must.
We had a brand spanking new building just for us two years ago (or thereabouts) and whilst it took some getting used to compared to our previous 60 year old shed it’s very comfortable. I can’t claim to know how much it cost but I don’t think there was much change out of £300,000 (may be completely wrong).
I would say that the classrooms are too small and that the main hall is of rather odd proportions but we muddle by. One benefit is that we now have a wired network that the squadron computers run off because the wires can be routed above the ceiling tiles (no asbestos!) compared to the old building. We did however have to lose our two Link trainers (one in full working order) in the move which was a shame. Another oddity is the ramp at the front which means meandering your way up to the front door, I believe there were supposed to be stairs as well but they were never put in. The main building is sited some distance away from our portacabin which whilst annoying isn’t really a problem at all but we do use the portacabin a lot less than we used to which seems wasteful, one side has been turned over to storage when it could be a classroom.
Having visited other squadron HQs in the wing I know just how lucky we are to have what we do, but maybe the money could have been used more wisely?
[attachment=212]sqnbuilding008.jpg[/attachment][/quote]
All newbuilds must have disabled access. Hence the ramp. Where I live the local climbing wall has a disabled parking space!
You would have throught ‘the finish’ would have been part of the orginal order. The finish being less than expected spec and overspend is displays a complete lack of project management. A son’s mates dad is a project manager for a construction company and having worked on some public sector projects said they are good pay days, as over-runs, so many fingers in the pie meant no chance of being OTIF and the final spec suffers, but their overtime and expenses were paid. So I bet the contractors, architects etc got paid in full, just us that have to put up with something that isn’t quite as expected.
You couldn’t make it up.
Similarly a squadron in our Wing had the doors moved so they opened on to walls, rather than into the room and had double sockets everywhere, rather than some of the singles. The OC at the time said it was astounding to think it was ‘designed’ by professionals. She said had they not got to see the plans, it would have been too late once they’d moved in. I bet if someone who was going to use your building had seen the plans beforehand, might have had this altered, as this is poor on all levels.
I’m amazed that it is only spec’d for 80 people, I thought all new single (180m) huts were spec’d for 100? By rights your building should be c.230. The spec is based on cubic area and apparently the spec is 1.5m[sup]3[/sup] per person, or was when our office was being redone.
[quote=“bucketofinstantsunshine” post=23323][quote=“MRAR” post=23316]I can’t claim to be a fan of that particular building nor the idea of sharing with the ACF but I suppose needs must.
We had a brand spanking new building just for us two years ago (or thereabouts) and whilst it took some getting used to compared to our previous 60 year old shed it’s very comfortable. I can’t claim to know how much it cost but I don’t think there was much change out of £300,000 (may be completely wrong).
I would say that the classrooms are too small and that the main hall is of rather odd proportions but we muddle by. One benefit is that we now have a wired network that the squadron computers run off because the wires can be routed above the ceiling tiles (no asbestos!) compared to the old building. We did however have to lose our two Link trainers (one in full working order) in the move which was a shame. Another oddity is the ramp at the front which means meandering your way up to the front door, I believe there were supposed to be stairs as well but they were never put in. The main building is sited some distance away from our portacabin which whilst annoying isn’t really a problem at all but we do use the portacabin a lot less than we used to which seems wasteful, one side has been turned over to storage when it could be a classroom.
Having visited other squadron HQs in the wing I know just how lucky we are to have what we do, but maybe the money could have been used more wisely?
[attachment=212]sqnbuilding008.jpg[/attachment][/quote]
All newbuilds must have disabled access. Hence the ramp. Where I live the local climbing wall has a disabled parking space![/quote]It does seem fairly typical of the way things are that we all now seem to have to be inconvenienced in addition to helping out the disabled.
