{"id":898,"date":"2024-07-22T11:55:00","date_gmt":"2024-07-22T10:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/sustainability\/?p=898"},"modified":"2025-04-08T10:37:00","modified_gmt":"2025-04-08T09:37:00","slug":"redeveloping-sustainably-supporting-the-community-at-castle-leazes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/sustainability\/2024\/07\/22\/redeveloping-sustainably-supporting-the-community-at-castle-leazes\/","title":{"rendered":"Redeveloping sustainably: supporting the community at Castle Leazes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

As works progress on redeveloping the University\u2019s vast Castle Leazes student accommodation<\/a>, sustainability is being considered at every step. Examples of this work include plans for Biodiversity Net Gain<\/a> on the site and the decision to deconstruct the halls rather than demolishing them to reuse and recycle as many of the buildings\u2019 materials as possible. Amongst these efforts, the Accommodation Team has been doing some incredible work to ensure that the hall\u2019s furnishings are being sustainably reused rather than thrown away.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Image: A visual of the redevelopment of Castle Leazes student accommodation. The project will preserve existing habitats where possible and create further new ones to ensure that the site achieves a biodiversity net gain. Credit: Newcastle University.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A sustainable Legacy<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Castle Leazes Halls is one of the University\u2019s largest and oldest halls of residence, with over 1000 student bedrooms across the site, and so the volume of furniture that needed to be reused was enormous. This prohibited colleagues\u2019 usual route of reusing items within the University due to a simple lack of sufficient demand, so colleagues in Accommodation worked hard to organise a mass donation of items to other organisations across the region. Utilising the City of Sanctuary network, a variety of charitable, public, and non-profit organisations were invited to pick out what they needed from the accommodation\u2019s stock, resulting in thousands of items being reused.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Included in this list of benefitting organisations were schools, The People\u2019s Kitchen, and even the City Library. Additionally, Urban Green also attended the site to accept donations of hundreds of pounds worth of plants which will now be replanted in parks throughout the city. The teams that came out to collect items were hugely appreciative of the donations and many left messages of gratitude for our wonderful accommodation colleagues:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI just wanted to say thank you for all your help and donations, it is really appreciated and our schools in the NEAT Academy Trust will really benefit from what we have collected over the last few days.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe People\u2019s Kitchen are massively appreciative for everything. We\u2019ll send you through an update of what we\u2019ve managed to do with the equipment but we’re very excited about the difference it\u2019s going to make.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOn behalf of the Cadets of Northumbria ACF, I would like to thank you and your team for all the fantastic furniture for our new Cadet Rest Area. I was in Otterburn during its first use at the weekend and I can tell you, the Cadets absolutely loved it. This is the first time in the history of NACF that they have had a proper kitted out rest area where they can truly relax, so it is amazing for them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Image: Chairs, tables, and other items from Castle Leazes are pictured in situ in their new home. Credit: Northumbria Army Cadets.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Image: Sofas and bean bags from Castle Leazes are pictured in situ in their new home. Credit: St Paul\u2019s Church of England Primary School.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A massive thank you to Helen Davis and the entire Accommodation Team<\/a> for their hard work organising this amazing donation project. In addition to the dedication of the teams involved, this work highlights the incredible co-benefits that sustainability and the circular economy can bring to projects and communities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you want to learn more about sustainability at our University, you can explore a variety of subject areas on our website<\/a>, in our Climate Action Plan<\/a>, and on this blog. Additionally, sign up to the Sustainability Network<\/a> newsletter for a monthly summary of the environmental work happening in our organisation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As works progress on redeveloping the University\u2019s vast Castle Leazes student accommodation, sustainability is being considered at every step. Examples of this work include plans for Biodiversity Net Gain on the site and the decision to deconstruct the halls rather than demolishing them to reuse and recycle as many of the buildings\u2019 materials as possible. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11771,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[151,14,11,22],"tags":[98,102,101,31],"class_list":["post-898","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-all-blogs","category-biodiversity","category-carbon","category-news","tag-biodiversity-net-gain","tag-castle-leazes","tag-circular-economy","tag-reuse"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/898","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11771"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=898"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/898\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":911,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/898\/revisions\/911"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=898"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=898"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=898"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}