5 August 2014

Pupils at a west London school had their playground effectively increased in size by around 30% after Costain staff made good use of the half-term holiday.

St Paul’s C of E Primary School, beside the Hammersmith Flyover, has had a section of its playground cordoned off for years due to the presence of two old wooden, pagoda-like structures.

The buildings had been intended to be used as outdoor classrooms but the idea did not catch on and, over the years, they had started to rot, resulting in them being cordoned off for safety reasons.

Graham Dean, Community Relations Manager on Phase 2 of the contract to strengthen the neighbouring flyover, happened to notice the mouldering buildings when he was visiting the school to arrange a poster competition for the pupils.

Seeing the restrictions they imposed on the children’s playground, he got clearance from Costain to use staff from the flyover site to improve matters.

Over the Whitsun half-term break, eight operatives spent around four days removing the rotting buildings, landscaping the area and generally tidying it up. Another eight personnel took volunteer days to assist.

“It was harder than I thought it would be, but we got it done,” said Graham.  Several benches, which were standing in isolation in the playground following the removal of the buildings were removed from their concrete emplacements and stored for future use.

“The school was really pleased as it opened up the whole of the playground that had been taped off to prevent any injuries to the children” said Graham, and it substantially improved the amount of space in which the youngsters could play.

In a letter to the site, head teacher Claire Fletcher was generous in her praise: “Thank you SO much for the amazing transformation of our school playground. We really cannot begin to thank you for your generosity and hard work. The playground looks amazing!

She added that she had been greatly impressed with the way in which Costain had managed the impact of the work on the other side of the school’s boundary fence.

“With such an enormous project at the end of the playground…we were understandably nervous of the potential disruption. However, we couldn’t have asked for a better contractor.

“When the back gates are manned when we take the children over to church, the workmen are always friendly, polite and helpful and the team completing the playground work was incredibly helpful and professional, even digging up, storing and enabling us to re-use the benches from the site.”

By way of more tangible thanks, the school made a much-appreciated doughnut delivery to the team!

Ends

 

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