‘Disaster village’ is just what is needed

Originally published in Evening Times, 19/5/2009

£30m facility with houses, factories, railway and even a church to help train firefighters

A NEW village complete with houses, shops, a church, a train line, an industrial area and a stretch of new motorway will take shape in Cambuslang next year.

But there will be just one thing missing ... residents.

For this will be where Strathclyde's firefighters will receive detailed training in everything from house fires to industrial accidents, terror attacks and rail crashes.

Today, as Community Safety Minister Fergus Ewing climbed onto a digger to launch the start of site work at Clydesmill Industrial Estate, the Fire & Rescue Service - Scotland's largest - took the wraps off the plan for its £30million state-of-the-art Fire Training Centre.

Area commander Robert Scott, head of the training centre project, and assistant chief officer David Hutchison, head of training, went for an advance look at the 40-acre greenfield site, close to the M74.

Mr Scott said: "Our firefighters will be trained in all sorts of scenarios here, reflecting the fact that we're no longer just a fire brigade, we're a fire and rescue service and there are additional responsibilities that come with that: water rescue, rescue from heights, urban search and rescue, different types of transport-related incidents."

At the moment the service, the second-largest fire and rescue operation in the UK and one of the largest in Europe, has a training centre at a cramped four-acre site in Cowcaddens, which it inherited in 1986 from the Glasgow Salvage Corps.

But there's only enough space to offer training in dealing with fires and the site also has to house an operational fire station, and vehicle workshops.

Training in such operations as urban search and rescue, building collapse and mass decontamination is offered at the service's Hamilton HQ.

But the new facility at Cambuslang will bring all the training together on one site.

No expense is being spared to make the 41-acre village' as realistic as possible.

"To all intents and purposes this will look like a residential village," Mr Scott said. "It will simulate all the types of dwellings and premises you'd find in a real village.

"There will be a detached house, two semis, a tenement block, a seven-storey multi, plus shops and other retail establishments, and an underground car-park, all of which will be able to stage different types of emergencies.

"The church will be used for training related to public gatherings and rescue at height.

"The stretch of motorway will allow our firefighters to be trained in road traffic collisions.

"Its road network will be exactly the same width that you would find in a village. Our firefighters will be turning up to a very realistic and meaningful training experience which will be invaluable when they have to do it for real."

He added: "The train line will have a train that will be able to be winched into a tunnel, onto a level crossing or onto a platform, allowing us to simulate these types of emergencies.

"There will be an industrial area beyond that, where we can stage industrial incidents in petro-chemical plants, electrical sub-stations and suchlike."

A big part of Clydesmill will be a 5000sq m, two-storey academic building with classrooms, lecture rooms, an auditorium and incident management training rooms.

The site was chosen because of its "fantastic" transport and infrastructure links. There are four train stations within a mile-and-a-half, the nearby motorway is being extended and the River Clyde runs close by.

Mr Hutchison said: "Clydesmill will be the only facility of its type in the UK, and we see other fire and rescue services aspiring to build a similar centre.

The Assistant Chief Officer added: "We're still in the design phase and this part of the project will be finalised in July.

"We'll hopefully have planning permission by the end of the year and construction will start this time next year."

The site work will last two years, so the new centre should be ready by 2012.

An agreement has been struck with the Scottish Government that if Clydesmill has spare capacity, it can be used to train firefighters from throughout Scotland.

Strathclyde Fire & Rescue's Chief Officer, Brian Sweeney, said: "The new centre will be the best available to any fire and rescue service in the United Kingdom.

"The sheer range of major incidents - from house fires to rail crashes - that will be staged there will help ensure that the training needs of our firefighters are fully met and their safety and welfare is enhanced."

The site will also house a community fire station ... but this 'real' project will replace the existing Cambuslang and Parkhead stations.