The first direct arena (formerly known as the Leeds Arena) is a 13,500 capacity entertainment focused arena in Leeds, West Yorkshire. It is the first in the United Kingdom to have a fan-shaped orientation.
It was not only the shape of the building, but its huge indoor capacity which brought challenges to the project group as a whole. It was the Leeds office of consultants Arups who were tasked with the M&E design while Leeds based Rotary were appointed as the M&E contractor.
In a bid to pass on their valuable expertise and knowledge of the project to budding building services students of Leeds College of Building and Leeds Metropolitan university, CIBSE YE Yorkshire have organized a site tour and CPD initiative for the students to attend on Wednesday the 25th of March.
The tour will take place between 2:45pm and 5.00pm at the First Direct Arena, on 25th March, and is open to all CIBSE and CIBSE YE members. The intension is to tag this event to a CIBSE YE social, more info to follow.
The Tour will be conducted by Blyth Davies from Rotary, Blyth was the project manager for the site.
The plan is for us to split into 2 groups. Group 1 will do the arena tour and group 2 will do the technical seminar. Each will last an hour before swapping over. In total we are expecting to be up at the arena between 3-.00pm – 5.00pm.
Wes Campbell from North East based AHS (Air Handling Systems) will also be on hand to drill deeper into the manufacture and design of some of the air handling plant on site. Rotary have already shown their commitment to the initiative and have kindly offered to conduct the tour. CIBSE YE are also in talks with other companies involved with the project and hope to have a wealth of experience and knowledge relating to this project to pass onto the students of Leeds.
The technical seminar will be done by Rob Gill from Yonder Consulting. Rob did the model and part L for the site. Rob will be running through all the services on site and will then do a talk on Part L.
Once the tour has finished, we have arranged for the students to go to the Pit bar on Merrion Street. We will be providing food and drinks for them complementary of CIBSE YE Yorkshire. The room we have booked has table tennis, table football etc so there should be plenty to keep everyone entertained. Pit Bar is just a short walk back to the college for those who have travelled by car.
Further details, including a location map for the Arena can be seen on the Arenas Website
Click link here to go to Leeds Arena Website
Attendance at the event is open to CIBSE/YEN and non members on a first come first served basis (max 35 people).
The Event will be covered by Lingfield PR and photo’s and write ups for the day’s events will be published in the trade press. I’m sure we can get some of this info through to the college to put on your web site etc.
Should you wish to attend, and in order to assist with refreshments/logistics please contact the event Organiser Andrew Keegan on the following Email address.
Similarly if you have any questions or concerns, also contact Andrew.