ISG will focus on design and procurement for a research facility that will serve as a hub for the UK Dementia Research Institute and a new home for the UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology
The project team is being led by the consultancy Arcadis, which will provide project management, cost management and specialist support services. An existing design team, novated to ISG, will be led by the architectural firm Hawkins/Brown and includes the engineering consultancies Hoare Lea and Ramboll.
It is anticipated that building work will begin early in 2020, with completion scheduled for late 2023 in readiness for a process of migration and occupation in 2024. The site, on Gray’s Inn Road, will bring together hundreds of clinicians and researchers from different disciplines to tackle the global health challenges of neurological diseases.
The new development is part of Transforming UCL, a £1.25bn ten-year programme of investment in UCL’s estate to support the university’s continuing growth. Along with the new neurology centre in King’s Cross, the programme is seeing the creation of new world-class facilities in UCL’s Bloomsbury campus and the construction of UCL East, an entirely new campus in east London, adjacent to the Olympic Park.
The project is being designed to BIM Level 2 standards using fully collaborative web-based software, and is targeting BREEAM Excellent, with an aspiration for Outstanding.
The facilities will create a shared, open and collaborative environment for over 500 neuroscience researchers, including a specialist NHS clinical component led by UCLH. The new site will also incorporate space for public engagement, allowing connection to communities and shared progress in finding better ways to diagnose, treat and prevent dementia.
Professor Alan Thompson, Dean of the UCL Faculty of Brain Sciences, said: “The new site will provide a home to three world-leading organisations: the UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology, the headquarters and UCL component of the UK Dementia Research Institute, and the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery.
“The new site, within minutes of Queen Square, will provide state-of-the-art facilities and enabling technologies, ensuring that our research scientists have the very best chance of discovering new treatments for these devastating diseases.”
Professor Bart De Strooper, UK Dementia Research Institute Director, said: “The UK Dementia Research Institute has been set up to find scientific solutions to one of society’s biggest health challenges. We have a huge knowledge gap in dementia – our mission at the UK Dementia Research Institute is to fill that gap. I see our UCL hub as part of a virtual UK Dementia Research Institute building.”
Lee Hutchinson, Managing Director for ISG’s Science and Health Business, said: “At ISG we thrive on fostering innovation and collaboration, and we encourage our people to think differently and deliver smarter environments.
“A vital space will be created for scientists, researchers and clinicians of this world-renowned institute, to discover new ways to diagnose, treat and ultimately prevent one of the greatest health challenges of our time.”
