Aycliffe Today Business Aycliffe Today Business Issue 38 | Page 26

26 | Aycliffe Today Business
Finley Structures estimating manager
Andrew Workman at the Maiden
Castle sports facility in Durham.
Praise for ‘proactive’ Finley Structures
on Maiden Castle sports development
By Martin Walker
Newton Aycliffe steel firm Finley Structures has won praise from a main contractor
as it continues to work on a high-profile North-East sports development.
C
onstruction firm Galliford Try awarded
family-run Finley Structures a contract
to fabricate and erect 640 tonnes of
steel for Durham University’s expansion of
its sports facilities.
Work started earlier this year on the £31m
development at Maiden Castle, on the
outskirts of Durham city.
The facility, once completed, will include
an indoor cricket hall, a 12-court multi-use
sports hall, suitable for international and
national competitions, a martial arts dojo,
fitness suite, purpose-built recovery facilities
and high-performance weights rooms.
Once the new facility is ready in August,
the existing centre will be refurbished,
increasing the facilities for fitness classes
and building a specialist sports laboratory.
A ground-breaking ceremony was held last
August as Finley Structures started work on
fabricating the steel, which has now been
erected on site.
Galliford Try senior projects manager Paul
Mares said: “Finley Structures have been
involved with the Maiden Castle project
from our initial bid, assisting the erection
sequence and value engineering, ensuring
both Galliford Try and our client have a robust
price and programme.
“Throughout the design stage both Finley
Structures and their design team have been
proactive in managing the process to ensure
they arrived on site as planned.
“Once on site the team have been a
pleasure to work with, the frame and
metal decking packages have been erected
safely, to programme, by a team who have
identified any potential issues in advance
and worked with the wider team to resolve
them, ensuring no delays have been
incurred.
“This has not only been noticed by
Galliford Try, but also our client, who has
commented on the speed of erection. I look
forward to working with the team again.”
The Maiden Castle development is the
second major project to be awarded by
Galliford Try in recent months, with Finley
Structures also currently working on a
930-tonne contract at the CTAR Building in
Leeds.
Finley Structures estimating manager
Andrew Workman said: “We’ve been
working closely with Galliford Try for some
time now and have struck up an excellent
understanding.
“We’ve worked with them on several
projects and we’re delighted to hear they’re
happy with the job we’re doing.”
Finley Structures, formed by John Finley in
2000, was buoyed by a triple contract boost
from major national firm BAM Construction
towards the back end of last year.
Finley Structures will fabricate and erect
380 tonnes for the Advanced Wellbeing
and Research Centre (AWRC) for Sheffield
Hallam University.
Also at Sheffield Hallam, Finley Structures
will construct 130 tonnes of steel for the
National Centre of Excellence for Food
Engineering (NCEFE) which is already at
the centre of an expanding network of
business, industry groups, academics and
engineers working to solve specific business
challenges within the food and drink sector.
And the Aycliffe construction specialists
will fabricate and erect 820 tonnes of steel
for a new five-storey building for BAM
Construction at New College Bradford, which
was due to get underway last December and
should be completed in September this year.