Balfour Beatty lined up for Edinburgh University’s latest project

By GARETH MACKIE
Published on 29/08/2012 00:00

Edinburgh University has named construction and infrastructure giant Balfour Beatty as preferred bidder for its £110 million student accommodation project.

The development will provide accommodation for 1,160 postgraduate students off Holyrood Road in the city’s Old Town, as well as an “outreach centre” for community-based teaching activities.

Balfour Beatty said the 50-year contract will cover the design, build and maintenance of the facilities. Energy will be provided by the university’s combined heat and power energy centre.

The group said earlier this month that the building market in Scotland had been more robust than the English regions as it reported a 7 per cent rise in profits to £95m for the first six months of the year, on revenues 7 per cent higher at £4.8 billion. It is also chasing work on campuses across the US and has been named preferred bidder for a student housing project at the University of Nevada, Reno.

Chief executive Ian Tyler said: “We have worked with the University of Edinburgh on numerous projects over the past 18 years and look forward to supporting them in realising their long-term aspirations to enhance the postgraduate student experience.”

The plans represent the university’s biggest development since the creation of its informatics centre near George Square.

Most of the work will be on a site between Holyrood Road and the Canongate, but postgraduate accommodation will also be created on a gap site on the other side of Holyrood Road, near Viewcraig Gardens.

Nigel Paul, the university’s director of corporate services, said: “This is an important project for the university and we are pleased to have reached this key milestone in delivering our plans for the Holyrood campus.”