Crossrail update and defects survey meeting on 19 June

This does not directly affect Ben Jonson House, but for those interested in Crossrail here is a note from Jane Smith, Chair of the Barbican Association:

Dear All - and particularly those in: Shakespeare, Willoughby+Speed, John Trundle+Bunyan,Lambert Jones, Lauderdale, Defoe, Gilbert, Andrews, Brandon Mews

• Crossrail are holding a meeting for residents on 19 June to explain how they propose to conduct the defects surveys ahead of the tunnels coming through.

• I believe that defects surveys are only relevant to those houses in the settlement zone (which had assessments done about 2 years ago) - ie those listed above.

• We were told at the recent Crossrail liaison forum that the tunnels are likely now to come under the estate early next year (in mid January and mid February) rather than the end of this year.

Crossrail will be doing their own publicity about the meeting in due course, but I thought I would let BAGC and Housegroup chairs know about it now so they can get it in their diaries. I'll also ask the estate office to circulate the relevant blocks via the email and a notice. 

Below is the information about the meeting provided by John Parrott, the community relations manager for this area.
Venue - City of London School for Girls

Date and time – 6.30pm on Thursday 19 June 2014
The meeting will begin with a 10 minute update on tunnelling progress, following on from the September meeting. The next 50 minutes or so will involve a presentation about the pre-tunnelling defect survey process (notification, communication, purpose, benefits for property owners, process for those with settlement deeds versus those without) followed by a Q&A session. 

These surveys are intended to baseline the condition of the property ahead of any small-scale ground settlement arising from the tunnelling. The surveys will make it easier to identify any defects that arise due to the tunnelling. It should be emphasised that the process of tunnelling has been modelled by expert designers, and only very small movements are expected. We will survey any building predicted to be affected by 10mm settlement or more, and any listed building where 1mm or more is predicted. Tunnelling is not expected to reach Barbican until late this year or early 2015, so we expect to be contacting occupiers individually from late summer onwards to arrange surveys. It would be very helpful if residents can respond promptly to our surveying consultants when they receive a letter, so as to avoid repeated attempts to contact them. At the meeting Crossrail would want to deal with any concerns of the residents, put their minds to rest about the level of impact, and understand how we can most efficiently arrange the surveys.