Building Weekly Digest: 27 January 2023

There's lots to catch up on this week, as we consider when demolition might be better than retention, take a deeper look at what it means to build a data centre, gather views from legal experts, push on with the #BuildingtheFuture Commission and cast another look back through the archives as part of our 180th birthday celebrations. You can explore all of this below.

From the archives: Setbacks on the world's first underground railway, 1860

This week’s archive offering is based around a group of news items on the construction of the Metropolitan Railway, the first part of the London tube network to be built and the world’s first underground railway line. Work had started in March of 1860 following years of delays and would complete two years later at a cost of ￡1.3m. Construction was beset by difficulties as the three pieces highlighted by Tom Lowe in this week's archives deep dive reveal. Another must-read instalment in this series. #Building180

This week from the Building the Future Commission

There has been plenty coming out of the Building the Future Commission. First, we published a case study as part of our net zero & energy stream exploring when demolition might be better than retention. It's an in-depth discussion of the topic with commissioner verdicts from Simon Wyatt , of Cundall , and Clara Bagenal George from Introba . We have also introduced two of our content streams: infrastructure & planning and education & skills. And we have interviews with two of our commissioners Lara Oyedele ??? ?? , president of the Chartered Institute of Housing , and Gleeds chairman Richard Steer FRICS, Hon FRIBA, FCIOB, FAPM . You can read the former here and the latter here. Finally, Alison Nicholl head of Constructing Excellence , welcomed the launch of the commission at the organisations annual general meeting where industry leaders called for radical thinking.

What you need to know about data centre construction

Data centres are still booming despite the looming recession, so more firms are looking for a piece of the action. In this piece, Building's Daniel Gayne spoke to industry veterans to get some advice for the newcomers to the sector. Hear from experts including Warren Pickance , managing director of ISG , Rennie Dalrymple , managing director at Concert - a Ridge company , and Robert Thorogood , data centre lead at HDR , to get the inside scoop.

5 minutes with... Ellie Jenkins at Akerlof

In the latest piece in our '5 minutes with...' series we speak to Akerlof consultancy partner Ellie Jenkins. She explores her work developing the Value Toolkit, making good ideas work at scale, the problem with tall buildings and her love of Welsh beaches.

From the legal desk

Our legal contributors have been covering some huge topics this week, all are definitely worth a read. First off we had Steven Carey is a partner at Charles Russell Speechlys , exploring how a recent case demonstrates an altered approach to concurrent delay that moves away from the ‘first in time’ approach. Next up, Stuart Patience , head of solar PV at Hollis , and Tim Brown , a senior associate in the planning team at Trowers & Hamlins , unpacked why it is important to consider solar panels in planning applications. Finally, Emma Honey and Ben Sharples from Michelmores have taken a look at the new nutrient neutrality requirements and how developments meet the new rules on nitrate and phosphate pollution?

Thanks for reading and have a wonderful weekend