Celebrating grass snakes, Bronze Age burials and 1 million construction hours!

Hi, I’m Richard Tindal, Project Director for Larkhill Garrison at Aspire Defence Capital Works. You may have heard that we recently completed one million hours of construction work at Larkhill Garrison for the Army Basing Programme (ABP).

If you keep up-to-date with the programme, you will know that it’s a joint programme between the Army and DIO which includes the return of around 4000 British soldiers from Germany to the UK in summer 2019. It also involves relocating numerous units within the UK.

As part of the programme we’re delivering new and improved single living and working accommodation at garrisons across the Salisbury Plain Training Area and Aldershot.

One million construction hours includes coming across some interesting challenges including relocating 400 lizards and 80 grass snakes to a safe green area where they will not be affected by the construction work – we get up close to all sorts of wildlife, much of which is protected.

We’ve had several archaeological investigations following the discovery of Bronze Age burials near new mess buildings and laid 70,000 bricks, dug out 24km of utility trenches and poured 120,000m³ of concrete.

Some of the assets we’ve already completed include regimental headquarters, offices, training facilities and stores. We’ve also handed over eight Junior Ranks’ single living accommodation (JR SLA) blocks.

We’re still working hard …

Our construction work doesn’t stop yet! We’re working hard on building three regimental headquarters, stores, garages, a workshop, three messes, a Junior Ranks’ diner, more JR SLA blocks, officer and Senior Ranks SLA and various car parks. We’re also working on a Physical and Recreational Training Centre along with a new Medical and Dental building for military personnel and families.

A lot of planning has gone into this programme with DIO, the Army, our contractors and supply chain, which has allowed us to build and foster effective working partnerships. We’ve maintained an impressive pace of progress across all our building sites since we started construction here at The Royal School of Artillery in November 2016.

Reaching one million construction hours is a significant milestone that we’re all proud to recognise. I look forward to handing over more modern, purpose-built, high quality assets, to enable soldiers based at Larkhill to live, work and train in the best environment possible.