Normally I would just link to the original document(.doc file) but I felt this should get it’s own post here too. Here is the official response by Aberdeen City Council to the consultation evening of Nov 6th.
CONSULTATION FEEDBACK ON NEW SCHOOL FOR BUCKSBURN AREA
During the consultation meeting at Bankhead Academy on 6 November 2008 regarding the proposals to
1. replace Bucksburn and Newhills Schools with a new school (capacity 350), this consultation will consider all possible Council-owned sites but with the recommendation being the current Newhills campus
2. vary the delineated area (catchment area) in relation to Bucksburn, Newhills and Stoneywood Schools to take effect pending decision on the redevelopment of either the Bucksburn or Newhills site
I undertook to provide a response to a number of questions raised from the floor. The following information seeks to provide those answers or clarify points raised by participants based on the information available to officers at this time.
Issue – Play park ownership – Bucksburn Site
The area currently utilised as a play park adjacent to the Bucksburn School is in the ownership of Aberdeen City Council and this could be considered as a land on which to construct a new school whilst retaining the existing building similar to the scheme suggested for the Newhills site. The limitations of the area of linking ground between this and the existing school grounds would need to be considered in the overall design and school management arrangements. As with the Newhills site, a full survey would be required on the suitability of the land if this site went forward from this stage in the process.
Issue – Vehicle Access to Newhills Site
Access for parent drop off on the Newhills site and access for construction vehicles to the site were raised. At present, access to the school is limited to the one rather narrow roadway (Wagley Parade) which causes congestion problems due to its narrow width and length. The area of land identified as the potential site for the school could also be accessed in future via Netherhills Place. This could initially provide construction access away from children and, through playground design, it would be possible to create a traffic system which required vehicles to enter via one roadway and exit via the other thus reducing congestion when the new school became fully functional with the removal of the old building.
Issue – Advertising of the Event
Details of the public meeting were provided in a press advert in both the Press & Journal and Evening Express published on Friday, 3 October 2008. Letters were provided to each of the 3 primaries concerned in the proposals. These were delivered to the schools on Thursday, 2 October following which they were then sent home via pupils similar to all other school information. We do recognise that this letter did not contain the details of the meeting. The letter advised parents that a consultation was to commence, of the consultation period and how to access the consultation document. The public meeting is detailed on page 3 of the consultation document.
Issue – Inclusion Strategy
The inclusion policy for the council was requested, that provided the context for supporting children both within a mainstream Primary school as well as in a specialist provision. An extract is quoted below and the full version can be provided on request.
Introduction
Aberdeen City Council has a Policy of Inclusion, the main aim of which is to ensure that children and young people with additional support needs receive adequate and efficient provision as stated in the Education (Additional Support for Learning) (Scotland) Act 2004. Our definition for inclusion is:
“the process of developing flexible systems to support the needs of all children and young people through collaborative partnership working.” Strategy for Inclusion
The key principles which apply to children and young people with additional support needs are:
* Children First
* Value Existing Staff and Resources
* Planning Together
* Flexibility of Resources
* Consent and Confidentiality
Our aim is to provide a range or continuum of provision to provide the most appropriate support to the individual child or young person.
In Aberdeen City we are in the process of moving towards 3 tiers or levels of provision;
Tier 1: Mainstream Primary and Secondary Schools with support
Tier 2: Mainstream Primary and Secondary Schools with extended facilities
Tier 3: Free-standing Specialist School
Issue – Condition Survey details
The report detailing the condition of all schools within the City Council’s estate was prepared by a member of the Council’s technical staff following the guidelines provided by the Scottish Government. These guidelines “The condition core fact Building our future: Scotland’s School Estate” are available on the Scottish Government webs site
http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Resource/Doc/175441/0049453.pdf
The information recorded is designed to provide an overall report on building condition summarised into the 4 category bands. The levels recorded for each element is based on information from a number of sources including site inspections, maintenance history, health and safety audits, structural surveys, insurance inspections, and fire risk assessments. The information from these various sources when summarised in this manner and the weighting elements applied as directed by the Scottish Government, allow staff to identify those facilities that require the most urgent attention and thus direct scarce resources towards the correct areas of the school estate. This was the process used in compiling the council report.
Issue – Refurbishment Costs
Officers have advised that to provide actual costs for the refurbishment of individual properties would require in-depth surveys, specifications and quotations from contractors. However officers working on the current 3Rs project have provided the following comment:
“It is difficult to give clear advice here because so much depends on the state and nature of the buildings to be refurbished. For example, a school on sloping ground and with a number of levels internally will have challenging, and potentially very expensive, Disability Discrimination Act compliance issues to deal with. Similarly, the type of construction will influence the potential cost of refurbishment. In the 3Rs Project, all three bidders indicated that, whilst it was reasonably cost effective to refurbish Seaton (although a new school option was also offered there) the same could not be said for Hazlehead – where each of the three bidders independently proposed a new school solution rather than a refurbishment. It must be understood that a refurbishment will invariably be a compromise solution in respect of orientation of the building on the site; layout and flexibility of the internal spaces; and overall space standards.
In the 3Rs project, the cost of refurbishment of Seaton was approximately two-thirds the cost of a new build. The running costs, however, are likely to be higher than for a similarly sized new school since the thermal insulation levels will not be as high. A difficulty with refurbishing a great many of our schools is that the external materials and the physical structure are such that it is difficult to add significantly to the natural lifespan of the building and so, over a longer period of time, there are issues re cost effectiveness and eventual replacement”.
It is also understood that the costs involved in refurbishing Hanover Street School will be much closer to that required for a new build cost, and may in fact be higher although a new school would not be a granite build. During refurbishment projects, it is not uncommon for the scope of work to increase as work progresses and unforeseen problems arise once walls and ceilings are exposed and previously unseen items come to light. This can result in budget escalations where as new-build projects should remain within a more planned and managed final cost.
Issue – Crèche Provision
During the earlier stage of these proposals when consultation was undertaken at the informal stage during May 2008, a crèche was provided on the evening of the event utilising staff from the Council’s Creche services to provide the required level of trained staff. When arrangements were being made for the formal consultation event on 6 November 2008, the officer organising the meeting reviewed the utilisation of the crèche and balanced this against the cost previously incurred and took a decision that this service could not be justified (less than 10 children on previous occasions were placed in this service at a cost of £400 to the authority). Arrangements were made to have the room adjacent to the assembly hall made available however without council provided staff.
This allowed parents to make arrangements to share care arrangements, an opportunity that was undertaken by a group organised via the Bucksburn Parent Council. I can only apologise if any parent felt that this prevented them attending the event and we shall, for future events, review how childcare arrangements are put in place to ensure an equal opportunity is available to all parents.
Issue – Congestion at the Newhills Site
Congestion is an issue experienced outside many schools across the City and is the result of a high number of cars arriving at the same location at the same time. We do not know how parents and pupils would choose to travel to a new site but believe the shorter the journey, the less likely car use is. One of the reasons the site of Newhills has been proposed is that it will provide a shorter journey for a greater number of pupils.
The proximity of all primary pupils, at both schools as of September 2008, to both sites has been identified using the postcodes. This exercise provided the following information:
| Radius | Newhills Site | % | Bucksburn Site | % |
| Within 500m | 123 | 41 | 34 | 11 |
| Within 800m (0.5 mile) | 179 | 60 | 75 | 25 |
| Within 1km | 198 | 66 | 133 | 44 |
| Within 1600m (1mile) | 248 | 83 | 262 | 87 |
| over 1 mile | 52 | 17 | 38 | 13 |
Furthermore, this exercise identified possible changes in distance to a school at either site.
If the site of Newhills is selected, the impact on the distance for Bucksburn pupils can be seen.
The radius distance to the Newhills site: will remain the same for 26 Bucksburn pupils; will increase for 49 Bucksburn pupils and will decrease for 45 Bucksburn pupils
If the site of Bucksburn is selected, the impact on the distance for Newhills pupils can be seen.
The radius distance to the Newhills site: will remain the same for 20 Newhills pupils; will increase for 141 Newhills pupils and will decrease for 19 Newhills pupils
Travel Trends
A travel survey of primary pupils attending both schools was conducted in September 2008. The responses indicate that:
28.2% of pupils travelled by car & 50.9% of pupils walked to school at Bucksburn and 18.2% of pupils travelled by car & 68.2% of pupils walked to school at Newhills
Projected Car Use
If the existing travel data is combined, 22.1% of pupils would travel to school by car. If the roll of the new school is 350 pupils, this would equate to 77 pupils travelling by car. This would be the same for either site.
NB – the number of pupils travelling by car will be higher than the number of cars actually arriving at the site due to siblings travelling together, so would be less than 77 cars. However, this does not take into account the impact a longer journey to school would make on travel choices.
Radius from Newhills site would: remain the same for 206 pupils; increase for 49 pupils and decrease for 45 pupils
Radius from Bucksburn site would: remain with the same for 140 pupils; increase for 141 pupils and decrease for 19 pupils
If access to the Newhills site can be improved, as would be desirable for this project, then this would help combat congestion issues. This could hopefully be achieved by including features like a drop off zone or a one way system although such details would not be available until a feasibility study has been completed.
Issue – accuracy of map with pupil postcodes plotted
During the consultation meeting, maps were used to illustrate pupil postcode data. There were a small number of postcodes which could not be identified and therefore were not displayed on the map.
| Pupils | Matched on Map | Not Matched | Reasons not on map | |
| Newhills | 180 | 173 | 7 | 5 Aberdeenshire, 2 can’t locate |
| Bucksburn | 120 | 116 | 4 | 4 Aberdeenshire |
The maps do not look at nursery postcodes. The main reason for excluding this information is that not all nursery aged children in the area will attend Newhills or Bucksburn Nursery so the information is less complete than that available for primary pupils. However, we are in the process of conducting the same mapping exercise for nursery pupils and once completed, the information will be passed to the Parent Schools.
Issue – More Pupils from Newhills attend Bucksburn, than vice versa
One comment left on the night noted that ‘more pupils that live in the Newhills area are actually going to Bucksburn School’
25 pupils at Newhills School live in the Bucksburn catchment area and 38 pupils at Bucksburn School live in the Newhills catchment area. This is the case and contributes to the higher number of pupils that live closer to Newhills site then the Bucksburn site. To be objective, pupil postcodes were looked at without considering their current school, but instead, their proximity to each site was established. The proximity of pupils to each of the sites was one of the factors used to identify the Newhills site.
I hope that the above information is of help in responding to some of your concerns.
Yours sincerely
DAVID LENG, HEAD OF SERVICE
Culture and Learning
Neighbourhood Services (North Area)
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