Community Surveys

On this project they strive to leave a positive legacy with the impact they have on individuals, the environment, the value chain and in the communities where they work. A key part of their stakeholder and community engagement was to carry out community surveys at three different stages; pre-construction, during construction and post construction.

With the knowledge that this project would be the catalyst for attracting direct investment into the city, with the potential to create many well paid future jobs locally in the Finance and IT industries, they were aware of the huge impact the change to the former Barracks site would have on the surrounding community. As expected from the outset the project drew a lot of attention from many members of the community.

This resulted in a great number of engagements in the pre-construction phase especially, feedback was for the most part very positive, but they did have a small minority voicing negative opinions. It was their job to reassure the community, transparency and clear communication was the top priority, with regular updates and feedback, they found that opinions most definitely changed during the construction phase. Feedback has reduced by approx. 70% during the construction phase of the project and it is believed this is due to minimising disruption and maximising regular communication.

Local employment was a key driver for the success of the project, to-date it has provided almost 270 person weeks of paid employment for people who are long term unemployed and those who are in/leaving education or training. As the project draws to a close, they expect the feedback to increase again post-construction.