INTRODUCTION TO WycliffeRefurbBlog
Our church is undergoing a major refurb over the next 10 weeks and given that it is being brilliantly documented in pictures on our web site (http://www.wycliffe-church.org.uk/) I thought it would be good to try and blog it in words as well. I have'nt blogged before but will do my best. It goes without saying that each and every view expressed here entirely my own and not the churches corporately or anyone elses. Any problems with what is written please let me know.

We met the man on who's shoulders the delivery of our hopes and dreams (no pressure) rests on Friday. He is called Tom and he works for Stan Randell and Co, our builders. He will be here 5 days a week at least for the next 10 weeks and will be the site agent. It's his job to organise and manage the teams of workers who will do what needs to be done. He spent Friday planning with his boss and he's in the thick of it today getting the scaffolding sorted. Its early days, but first impressions are positive - they clearly want to do the job right.

He comes up from Watford every day (lucky man) and we managed to get off on a good footing by supplying the secret back street directions to the church car park so he can avoid the huge loop round by the Royal Berks.



Monday 19th January - 8am

Well, its started! As I write a gang of men are transporting large sections of scaffolding inside the church (presumably as part of the repainting and relighting in the roof), and another man is going hammer and tongs at the platform with a crowbar. To be perfectly honest it makes fairly painful watching as we have a thousand memories tied up in the platform and they have none -and it shows (thats not a complaint, just an observation).

Fair play to the builders - they always said it would start today, and start it certainly has. At this point I need to say a heartfelt thanks to every person who helped to clear the church ready for this day. You worked hard and long and what you did meant that the builders had no impedement to starting today at all - they just got cracking which they clearly wanted to do. It also meant that the clearing was done as sympathetically as it could be and with love. The builders would have cleared the space for us but would have charged a lot for the work and done it all with a sledge hammer................

09:29
First little wrinkle. The side path of the church is Cemetery Junctions equivalent to the M25 in terms of pedestrian traffic. At the present time we are seeing men removing very large heavy pieces of scaffolding with mothers and children and other assorted pedestrians weaving in and out round their lorry and underneath the scaffolding. Not the best. Quick call to our long suffering neighbours in Crown House gets us the use of their car park spaces - they say yes, as ever, and some semblance of safety is resumed.

11am - silence falls. Tea break time is sacrosanct. The postman comes as usual and its good to tell him our plans. This will be an oft repeated conversation but we need to keep hammering away at peoples preconceptions about 'church' and the organised chaos outside means there is plenty to ask about.

Music and movement are in the Wycliffe Room today (as there is also a smaller electrical job happening in the sports hall) and we are keeping an eye open for junior escapees who fancy inspecting the refurb more than they want to sing 'the wheels on the bus'.

11.30am - Enquin environmental turn up - they are here to look for asbestos. We have to have a full survey done before the builders will proceed with certain aspects of the work. Just one part of a fairly long list of statutory duties we have to comply with, all of which cost money. God is good though. We only found out about the need to check for asbestos last week and contacted this company who are based in South Wales. They 'just happened' to be working at the Hexagon on a much bigger job and so could fit us in almost immediately, causing no delay to the works.
I adopt the standard greeting - 'you won't find any asbestos here'. He in turn adopts the standard reply 'If I had a pound.........'. Fair comment. As you would expect with people who's job it is to work every day with potentially deadly materials they are good humoured and extremely relaxed.

11.35am - We pause to pray for the builders. We aim to try and do this every day, but we'll see. We pray for their safety, for wisdom and especially that they might understand that the place is much more than bricks and mortar. I would imagine that builders approach a property in a very un-emotional manner so if we can communicate the true purpose of the place to them then so much the better. Tom has already noted the numbers of people around the place. In his mind I think he expected the church to be deserted during the week!

12.40pm
Second wrinkle - Tom asks us to have a look at the pulpit. Despite the Baptist Union saying the pupit must be kept, it appears to be making its own bid for freedom from the wall. It has been leaning for a while and its getting worse. I look at the bulk of the burly scaffolder standing in the pulpit as we talk and consider making a clever comment. Decide against it.

Tempting as it is to say 'take the pulpit away - its unsafe' and to replace it with another design, that would'nt wash with the BU - we would need to replace like for like so we'll need to look at jacking the existing one up and pinning it back against the wall. Personally I blame the choir of angels at the Nativity.

1pm - An unscheduled visit by our stationery sales rep leads to a good conversation about what we are doing and why. Turns out he used to go to church. He's more keen to talk about whether we are 'high church' or 'more evangelical' - We tell him that we just want to let people know that Jesus loves them and why. As we leave he passes a group of Nepali lads playing football in the sports hall - I don' t think he can quite believe what he is seeing (on 'church' premises), but his pre-conceptions are being challenged and thats great. These sort of conversations happen a lot.

1.45pm - The glass doors at the front now have a large set of wooden protective covers made for them by Baz the carpenter, who I learn will also be on the job full time. They'll be taken off at night and put on in the morning. The builders plan to do most of their movement of materials and equipment through the front entrance.

We make a double check on the doors through to the lower back hall that they are securely locked so that no Japanese toddlers can escape through to a new and very large 'climbing frame' . The scaffold reaches the ceiling now so we put away mental images of determined Japanese children being rescued from the very top.

2.30pm

Well, it did'nt take long - Day 1 and the first major challenge presented. You will note my comment to the asbestos surveyor earlier that 'he would'nt find any asbestos here'............... well, of course, head bangingly inevitably, he has. There are old, capped pipes running under the pulpit that have asbestos cladding on them. Nowhere else in the building, just there, but that causes potentially major financial and operational problems. I should say that as they are, they are no health risk to anyone, and never ever were. Its the incorrect removal,manufacture and installation of asbestos that causes the health problems that have been so well publicised.
The surveyor is currently ripping up the floor in the small vestibule outside the communion cupboard to see how far these cladded pipes extend. The position of these pipes is directly under the pulpit - it may well have to come out fully after all!

Incidentally, the surveyor also passed comment that he had found a piece of asbestos rope under the floor boards as well. Asbestos rope? whatever next.

However, as previously stated earlier, God is good - its quite by 'chance' that these pipes were found as the surveyor would not have chosen to take the floor up by the pulpit steps, he was concentrating on the main floor area as would be expected. However the other workmen had already taken some of the floor up there in order to site the scaffolding and so the surveyor shone his torch down.......... We would far rather know about them now than later on when all the work would have ground to a halt because of it - at least we can plan a strategy now.

4pm
The surveyor proudly announces that he has found some more asbestos, 'fire proof boxing' round the base of the metal pillars that were in what was the vestibule. I give a fixed smile in return.

4.37pm
Finally, he leaves with some samples to analyse. In simple terms there is potential for delay at some stage as the stuff is removed and to remove it will not be cheap. Day 1 comes to an end.