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Regeneration underway at St Philip’s Marsh, Bristol

2nd Oct 2019

Hydrock is providing full multi-disciplinary engineering services for the exciting redevelopment of Silverthorne Lane, Bristol.

Silverthorne Lane is a 10.6 acre site to the east of Temple Meads train station and a key part of the wider regeneration of St Philip’s Marsh. This former industrial zone will be brought back to life with hundreds of homes, shops, commercial and community space.

Landowner and master developer, Square Bay, acquired the site in 2018 with Hydrock delivering a number of due diligence reports in support.

The vision for Silverthorne Lane is centred around a new comprehensive secondary school, the largest to be built in the city. The plans also include 367 new homes, including affordable housing, 80, 000 sq ft of commercial and community employment space and purpose-built student accommodation for up to 841 students.

Square Bay has selected development partners for the delivery of the site. The University of Bristol, Studio Hive and Atlas Land, the Department for Education and Future Generation will be looking to commence construction once planning is granted and the site has been remediated.

With the site divided into 6 plots Hydrock has subsequently been appointed by Studio Hive with Stirling-prize winning architects AHMM to deliver the ambitious vision on the challenging site for plots 2 to 4.

The site, which borders the Bristol Feeder canal, was originally an ironworks and is currently used for industrial storage. If planning permission is granted the existing warehouses will be demolished, with the exception of the listed historic curtilage that will be incorporated into the new structures.

In their place, five towers between six and eight storeys will be created, breathing new life into the area by offering over 300 residential units and 1,000 sq m of office space, along with 500 bike spaces and 100 car parking spaces.

Hydrock’s structural engineering team will create a new canal front walkway, including a cantilevered jetty that will go via steps down to the canal front. We will also deliver a solution to a complicated interface to enable building work to take place right up to the historic canal wall. The existing warehouse building known as the Erecting Shed will be repurposed as new office space.

Hydrock’s M&E team will be working on solutions to counter limited floor space and the need to raise sub stations above flood level for the protection of any systems.

We are also providing full building performance engineering, geotechnical and transportation engineering services on the project.

A planning application was submitted in August with Bristol City Council due to make a decision on the proposed redevelopment early next year.