You can see from our webcam that the block work is now up to the first floor level. What you can’t see is that the first floor floor-slabs are now being poured. This is basically a large amount of concrete being poured over a thick wire mesh that is constructed on some steal decking. After the concrete is set a reinforced concrete floor in ready to walk on and for the next levels of block work to be constructed. If you watch the stop motion footage from the last 24hrs you will see the crane with a large bucket pouring the concrete floors.
The plan is for the roof and walls to be fitted late May/ early June. The site will then appear quite as the focus of the activity will move indoors.
The very cold weather and deep snow in recent weeks has led to some delays but we are still on target for a Spring 2011 opening. You may have heard people talking or seen news that the project is over budget too. It’s not! We are on budget. We are spending our contingency and that is worrying a few people but we are doing what we can to ensure that we maintain our contingency at 2% of remaining spend. The contingency is there to deal with those unknowns that appear within a project of this scale. I am confident that we will deliver this project on time and on budget. It’s very exciting to see the venue really taking shape: doors and windows (holes), floors and walls all appearing day by day.
The focus here at Shetland Arts is very much gearing up to operating the venue in 2011. Its not long now. I will try and get some close up images of the site uploaded in the next few days so you can share out excitement.
