445 Hackney Road

[930913]

I asked my father, a chartered surveyor, to look out for a space, and he just sent me 445 Hackney Road

It looks to me to tick most boxes, and it's about 500m down the road.

• A large light industrial/warehouse unit within this modern purpose built building located on the popular Hackney Road

Benefiting from a large car park and loading bay to the rear with goods lift access to the basement.
Ground - 3,431 sq ft
Basement - 3,683 sq ft
Yard - 6,500 sq ft

 

RENT
£105,000 per annum
£14.75 per sq foot
AMENITIES
Own Entrance from Street
Gas Central Heating
Parking
Loading Bay
Goods Lift
Outside Congestion Zone
COMMUNICATIONS
A few minutes walk from Cambridge Heath and Bethnal Green stations and served by a number of bus routes around the city.
ACCOMMODATION
GROUND & BASEMENT
7,114 sq ft
662 sq m
 

[Aden]

Looks good, but might be too expensive,
One of the main requirements - Price less than £75,000/year (inc.
service charge & VAT)

http://wiki.london.hackspace.org.uk/view/New_Space_Search_2012

[Jim Allanson]

Not sure if it's already been suggested, but with a much larger space, we could potentially have a designated sleeping area and rent out hammocks, raising some extra money and saving the problem of people sleeping in the space. Not sure what the licensing / legal restrictions for that would be though.

[Alexander Wright]

On Thu, 2012-11-15 at 22:09 +0000, Jim Allanson wrote:
> Not sure if it's already been suggested, but with a much larger space,
> we could potentially have a designated sleeping area and rent out
> hammocks, raising some extra money and saving the problem of people
> sleeping in the space. Not sure what the licensing / legal
> restrictions for that would be though.

Space=/=hotel

[SamLR]

It looks awesome. Anyone have any idea how unfeasible that amount of money would be? I'd guess it would work out closer to £200K/annum once rates & bills are included (pulling a number out of my arse obviously) which is ~£30/current member. 

Certainly worth a look and you never know, it we might be able to drive the price down. Having multiple floors + outside space would be amazing

S

[Tom Sands]

I think this is a fantastic find. While a bit on the pricey side something that large would allow for a lot of growth to cover the costs.

[Simon]

Looking on streetview there is a hotel next door so no need to have any designated sleeping areas for weary hackers
https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=445+Hackney+Road,+London,+E2+9DY&ll=51.531841,-0.060081&spn=0.002893,0.004849&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-a&channel=rcs&hnear=445+Hackney+Rd,+London+E2+9DY,+United+Kingdom&t=m&z=18&layer=c&cbll=51.532019,-0.060708&panoid=Jv_h-WpBB2O_bGb5qVEjWQ&cbp=12,301.35,,0,-6.17

[Sam Kelly]

Designated bar area.

--
Sam Kelly, http://www.eithin.co.uk/

That's it. We're not messing around anymore, we're buying a bigger
dictionary. - Tibor Fischer, The Thought Gang.

[Martin Dittus]

Maybe also an opportunity to team up with other organisations and start an umbrella housing org?

Who else may be interested in sharing this with us?

m.

[Jasper Wallace]

On Fri, 16 Nov 2012, Martin Dittus wrote:

> Maybe also an opportunity to team up with other organisations and start an umbrella housing org?

I really think that mixing sleeping and hacking would be disastrous. I
wouldn't mind subletting to a company or startup tho.

Also with that size of yard we could potentially rent out parking
spaces...

--
[http://pointless.net/] [0x2ECA0975]

[Tim Storey]

I think Jasper is right…

\t

[Clare Greenhalgh]

I agree and think mixing sleeping with anything the Hackspace does causes all sorts of tensions.
It also makes people more casual about it and it turns into a complete tip.
We could potentially think of renting a little of the space to members for businesses, but each space rented could not over run into others.
Just an idea if this is a real possibility...
Noko

[tom]

I thought we discussed this during the "lets rent Torrenz street" thread and decided subletting was a bad idea?

[Martin Dittus]

Ah ok, ta.

m.

[Tom Sands]

I'm sure the extra large space could be used for large builds and storage rather than sub letting and bed space. Giant robots anyone?

[Russ Garrett]

On 15 November 2012 21:13, 930913 <proxify....@googlemail.com> wrote:
> I asked my father, a chartered surveyor, to look out for a space, and he
> just sent me 445 Hackney Road

This is indeed a great looking space, but it is squarely out of our
price range. I need to do some work on our accounts to try and work
out exactly how much of a stretch it would be on our budget.

I am not against subletting space if it's partitioned off, but I am
against letting out desks.

--
Russ Garrett
ru...@garrett.co.uk

[Russ Garrett]

On 16 November 2012 11:47, Russ Garrett <ru...@garrett.co.uk> wrote:
> This is indeed a great looking space, but it is squarely out of our
> price range. I need to do some work on our accounts to try and work
> out exactly how much of a stretch it would be on our budget.

Just an update on how I'm calculating affordability here:

£105,000 is the lease price. In some cases VAT may be added on top of
it (but we don't know in this case).
+ £27,000 is the estimated business rates (that's an estimated
rateable value of £60k * 0.45)

So the monthly cost there is £11,000
+ £2000 bills and other costs
= £13,000
Which at 600 members is £22 per member per month.

We currently have 555 members paying an average of £11.50 per month.

--
Russ Garrett
ru...@garrett.co.uk

[tgreer]

Someone's looking to share... see above!

[Matt Peperell]

> We currently have 555 members paying an average of £11.50 per month.

I'd be interested to see a banded breakdown possibly over time, rather
than just one figure. I remember about a year ago (or perhaps it was
more) the average was £17.something per month. It's possibly worth
trying to find out why this might have changed so substantially. I
don't have any simple answers to that question though.

[Yarek Tyshchenko]

Money / total members seems like a bad metric.
How about total money / average people in the space.
That should also give us an estimate of full the space is becoming for the money

Best Regards
Yarek T

[Tim Storey]

It does look as if it is out of our league at the moment, having to come up with the extra money and deal with the logistics of possibly renting out space would place a lot of strain on whomever had to deal with it and a lot of extra strain on the Hackspace itself and would change its structure.
I'm not personally sure this is something we really want.
\t

[Dario]

Ohhh Tom... now you are getting my vote! I've been in love with Mechas since before it was cool.
I'm all for a HackSpace that allows for a Mecha Development Hangar... handy in case Angels, Sentinels or Na'vi decide to attack Shoreditch! ;-)

Cheers
Dario

[Peter "Sci" Turpin]

Also shuttlecraft.

[phil jones]

The ideal tenants to sublet to would be someone who wanted to offer a commercial CNC / laser-cutting / 3D printing bureau. Basically someone who is offering the kind of reliably available machining that hackspace members need but the hackspace itself doesn't guarantee. 

phil 

[Adrian Godwin]

Commercial providers of these services already exist in London. They have their place, but I don't suppose it's because they're a bus-ride away that they're used by only a small proportion of hackspace members.
 
Alpha-Ville sound much more interesting to me.

-adrian

[Jasper Wallace]

On Fri, 16 Nov 2012, Jasper Wallace wrote:

> On Fri, 16 Nov 2012, Martin Dittus wrote:
>
> > Maybe also an opportunity to team up with other organisations and start an umbrella housing org?
>
> I really think that mixing sleeping and hacking would be disastrous. I
> wouldn't mind subletting to a company or startup tho.
>
> Also with that size of yard we could potentially rent out parking
> spaces...

and/or put in some portacabins - anyone know the planning regs for temp.
buildings etc?

A portacabin might be a good idea for the biohackers, so they can restrict
access to potentially hazardus stuff.

[Will Beaufoy]

Yes a portacabin could work for us, although we'd need to run in water and electricity.

[Billy]

In Hackney, putting stuff in a portacabin is asking for trouble.

Better a clearly-labelled, lockable cupboard, in a well-ventilated
space.

Bonus points, for an access control, that you get after a lab-safety
induction, just like the machine tools... :D

-------------------------------------------------------------

Rather than seeing a property and going, "This! This", it would
probably be a good idea if we say what we want from a property, be it
building, yard-space, or lump of land.

Ideally, it'll have space for all the activities we've currently got,
and room for more...

I know that i'd like somewhere to do more metal-casting, and a bigger
forge, so i can practise metal shaping. Ian's class is great, but i
need to practise between classes.

Assuming that we can get a variety of spaces, what's the minimum and
maximum kit that we need for each of the things we like doing, then
work out how much room we need, and we've got some figures to aim for.

Of course, everyone is going to say, "<Insert your favourite activity
name here> is the most important, and we need more space for it!", but
then see how much of that can be got from a multi-purpose area, like
we've already got.

What are the different requirements for clean working area's, as well
as dirty workshop? How about we lay them out in a more integrated way?

So when we move, we set up the new place more effectively.

We shouldn't just go looking for properties, we should work out what
we're going to do when we get there...

> > > > > On 15 November 2012 22:18, Alexander Wright <ale...@gmail.com<javascript:>>

[David Sullivan]

On Saturday, 17 November 2012 11:09:00 UTC, Billy wrote:

Rather than seeing a property and going, "This! This", it would
probably be a good idea if we say what we want from a property, be it
building, yard-space, or lump of land.

Ideally, it'll have space for all the activities we've currently got,
and room for more...

Like this page on the wiki then?

http://wiki.london.hackspace.org.uk/view/New_Space_Search_2012 

David.

[Billy]

:)) Didn't know that this page existed... :))

[Martin Klang]

On 17 Nov 2012, at 11:33, Billy wrote:

> :)) Didn't know that this page existed... :))

That'd be because you haven't read the thread you're posting in then.

/m

[Will Beaufoy]

We're (the biohackers) still unclear about whether we can get away with just a lockable cabinet / freezer or whether we'll need a whole access-controlled room to comply with the GM licence we want to apply for. We're hoping we can find a new space that can enable us to do this.

My proposal if we find a new hackspace that has an area (and landlord) suitable for this, is that if we need an access controlled room,the biohackers 'sublet' this room from the larger space. It's paid for (by square footage) from biohackers membership fees and only people who have had a biohackers safety induction can use it.

[Tom Sands]

16:53 <@jontyw> Right. I will wear a pink cheerleaders skirt if we raise enough money to move to this place, or somewhere similar, in the next six months.

Posting this here for the record. We finally have a fundraising goal worth earning towards!

[Russ Garrett]

So, Jonty and I went and scoped this place out today. It's pretty
ideal. The highlights:

- Two floors (ground and basement), each of which individually is
larger than our current space.
- Two loading bays, and our own lift.
- Front door opens directly onto Hackney Road.
- A massive car park to ourselves (shipping containers?)

Pics are here:
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/pkplwxy9vgz90ih/SBdGkmchjS

Of course, the main issue is the price, but I think it's doable, at a
stretch. Last time we moved, we managed to get a 320% uptick in
membership revenue in the space of 3 months. If we can get half of
that, we'll be able to afford it. There's also the possibility of
partitioning off part of the space and subletting it while we build up
enough cash.

I'd much rather aim high and get somewhere awesome, rather than get
somewhere we can comfortably afford and have to move again in a year's
time.

Thoughts?

--
Russ Garrett
ru...@garrett.co.uk

[Tim Reynolds]

Oh my yes.

[Tim Storey]

having seen the pics yes

[Jasper Wallace]

On Wed, 21 Nov 2012, Russ Garrett wrote:

> So, Jonty and I went and scoped this place out today. It's pretty
> ideal. The highlights:
>
> - Two floors (ground and basement), each of which individually is
> larger than our current space.
> - Two loading bays, and our own lift.
> - Front door opens directly onto Hackney Road.
> - A massive car park to ourselves (shipping containers?)
>
> Pics are here:
> https://www.dropbox.com/sh/pkplwxy9vgz90ih/SBdGkmchjS
>
> Of course, the main issue is the price, but I think it's doable, at a
> stretch. Last time we moved, we managed to get a 320% uptick in
> membership revenue in the space of 3 months. If we can get half of
> that, we'll be able to afford it. There's also the possibility of
> partitioning off part of the space and subletting it while we build up
> enough cash.
>
> I'd much rather aim high and get somewhere awesome, rather than get
> somewhere we can comfortably afford and have to move again in a year's
> time.
>
> Thoughts?

Is roof access possible? There appear to be mobile phone antennas all over
the roof atm, so i'm assuming it's no, getting a decent ground station for
the sprite/kicksat is relativly important, even it would only be for a
short time.

(The pritchards road building's roof looks better).

I think one of the adjcent buildings is residential (the one round the
corner next to Billy's Cafe), so we might need to be careful about noise,
but i guess we can banish the angle grinders to the basement.

> On 19 November 2012 16:59, Tom Sands <itst...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > 16:53 <@jontyw> Right. I will wear a pink cheerleaders skirt if we raise
> > enough money to move to this place, or somewhere similar, in the next six
> > months.
> >
> > Posting this here for the record. We finally have a fundraising goal worth
> > earning towards!
>
>
>
>

--

[http://pointless.net/] [0x2ECA0975]

[Russ Garrett]

On 21 November 2012 23:16, Jasper Wallace <jas...@pointless.net> wrote:
> Is roof access possible?

They didn't rule it out.

> There appear to be mobile phone antennas all over
> the roof atm, so i'm assuming it's no, getting a decent ground station for
> the sprite/kicksat is relativly important, even it would only be for a
> short time.

I think trying to get kicksat reception amongst all the 70cm noise in
London is quite optimistic anyway. Better perhaps to find somewhere
outside of London.

> I think one of the adjcent buildings is residential (the one round the
> corner next to Billy's Cafe), so we might need to be careful about noise,
> but i guess we can banish the angle grinders to the basement.

There are residential buildings near, but the nearest one is across
the road. The basement is fairly ideal for the workshop anyway, and it
should keep the noise from travelling too far.

--
Russ Garrett
ru...@garrett.co.uk

[SamLR]

oh gods yes!

[Sam Kelly]

So basically, the only thing wrong with this site is that we don't
currently have the income stream to make it sustainable, but we do
have a reasonable expectation of growing our income stream, and we do
have a reserve to cover the moving-in period?

We should definitely go for it.

--
Sam Kelly, http://www.eithin.co.uk/

That's it. We're not messing around anymore, we're buying a bigger
dictionary. - Tibor Fischer, The Thought Gang.

[Dario]

Even if in the worst case scenario you need to set a minimum membership fee, this space looks amazing

[Russ Garrett]

On 21 November 2012 23:50, Sam Kelly <s...@eithin.co.uk> wrote:
> So basically, the only thing wrong with this site is that we don't
> currently have the income stream to make it sustainable, but we do
> have a reasonable expectation of growing our income stream, and we do
> have a reserve to cover the moving-in period?

Depending on how much overlap we have between spaces (the break clause
on our existing lease is three months), we may not have enough money
to cover the reserve, so we may need to borrow to cover that.

--
Russ Garrett
ru...@garrett.co.uk

[Sam Kelly]

Ah, gotcha. Can we stick some numbers on that? - presumably, the
unlikely-maximum excess would be three months of our current rent,
which IIRC would basically wipe out our reserves, especially with the
inevitable moving-out-moving-in expenses. Do we have credit at
sensible rates? And is this the sort of one-off expense that a pledge
drive, unique-artisan-tech auction, or short-term sponsorship deal
would help with, or would those be Too Much Faff for the timescale
involved?

I suppose basically the question boils down to, is this the kind of
financial question that the membership at large can usefully do
anything about beyond increasing our subscriptions where possible or
making one-off donations?

[Peter "Sci" Turpin]

On 21/11/2012 23:03, Russ Garrett wrote:

> So, Jonty and I went and scoped this place out today. It's pretty
> ideal. The highlights:
>
> - Two floors (ground and basement), each of which individually is
> larger than our current space.

Didn't someone mention upstairs space already having been rented?
Presumably they get a cut of car-park space and may have noise demands
to keep them friendly? Or do they just get the front parking spaces?

If the car-park is exclusively for the ground-floor use, it looks easily
large enough we could afford to sublet a few spaces to upper units for
parking perhaps (just an off the cuff idea). A little extra cash in the
pockets, and a lower chance of any complaints from them on occasion of
any issues.

> - Two loading bays, and our own lift.

Passenger or cargo lift?

> - Front door opens directly onto Hackney Road.
> - A massive car park to ourselves (shipping containers?)

Shipping containers? Shit just got serious. XD
I say autonomous robot races/battles. Or possibly go-carts.

> Pics are here:
> https://www.dropbox.com/sh/pkplwxy9vgz90ih/SBdGkmchjS
>
> Of course, the main issue is the price, but I think it's doable, at a
> stretch. Last time we moved, we managed to get a 320% uptick in
> membership revenue in the space of 3 months. If we can get half of
> that, we'll be able to afford it. There's also the possibility of
> partitioning off part of the space and subletting it while we build up
> enough cash.
>
> I'd much rather aim high and get somewhere awesome, rather than get
> somewhere we can comfortably afford and have to move again in a year's
> time.
>
> Thoughts?

It does look pretty ideal (and that countertop is crying out for a Burco
tea urn btw).
The floor in that basement is likely to get messed up by any heavy
engineering work down there. From the pics it looks like it was a dance
studio. We may need to take up the flooring around machine or welding
zones to expose concrete.

Looks easy to compartmentalise. I see ventilation ducting, which we may
need to check will get things out of the space rather than spread it
around in case of another Fimo-like situation. Though, separate ducts
for special cases really..

The safes are a nice touch, though may need to make note they're not for
use by lockpickers. Especially if we end up storing, say, the master
keys or donation pot take in them.

While I'm still not exactly flush with cash, I'm certainly willing to up
my membership fee a little bit to help.

Is the boxy bit with the red door in pic #5 a entry office/reception?
Being able to have a little area like that focussed on being very
welcoming could certainly draw new members. Some impressive finished
item on display, etc.

Love those high ceilings.

[Tom Sands]

From the pictures this place looks fantastic, superb find!

I'd happily double my membership contribution if it ment we had facilities such as these.

[Ciarán Mooney]

Hi,

My membership has lapsed, but I'm looking to start visiting again and
re-subscribe. Getting a brand spanking new space would be enough of an
incentive for me to do this.

I would also be happy to make a one off donation (or small
micro-loan-type-thingy) to a "moving" pot that would allow the
hackspace to negate the need to borrow entirely or at least at a
preferential rate.

Cheers,

Ciarán

[Russ Garrett]

On 22 November 2012 00:35, Peter "Sci" Turpin <s...@sci-fi-fox.com> wrote:
> Didn't someone mention upstairs space already having been rented? Presumably
> they get a cut of car-park space and may have noise demands to keep them
> friendly? Or do they just get the front parking spaces?

There are two other floors in the building, but they have their own
separate car park (and entrance). The car park in those pictures would
be exclusively ours.

> If the car-park is exclusively for the ground-floor use, it looks easily
> large enough we could afford to sublet a few spaces to upper units for
> parking perhaps (just an off the cuff idea). A little extra cash in the
> pockets, and a lower chance of any complaints from them on occasion of any
> issues.

This is a possibility, but we'd need to consider how to limit access.

> Passenger or cargo lift?

Cargo. It goes between three levels: loading dock (which is at
articulated lorry height), ground floor, and basement.

> The floor in that basement is likely to get messed up by any heavy
> engineering work down there. From the pics it looks like it was a dance
> studio. We may need to take up the flooring around machine or welding zones
> to expose concrete.

It was a warehouse. We think the cheap laminate flooring is very new,
probably added after the last tenants moved out to make the place look
more presentable. We wouldn't have to keep it all.

> Looks easy to compartmentalise. I see ventilation ducting, which we may need
> to check will get things out of the space rather than spread it around in
> case of another Fimo-like situation. Though, separate ducts for special
> cases really..

The ventilation ducting is a new gas-fired warm-air heating system. It
doesn't provide fresh air, we'd have to organise ventilation for the
basement.

> Is the boxy bit with the red door in pic #5 a entry office/reception? Being
> able to have a little area like that focussed on being very welcoming could
> certainly draw new members. Some impressive finished item on display, etc.

That's a vestibule for the entrance off Hackney Road.

--
Russ Garrett
ru...@garrett.co.uk

[Filthy hipster scum]

OHHHH shiny, I'm in. time to find another bike

On Thursday, November 15, 2012 9:13:26 PM UTC, 930913 wrote:

I asked my father, a chartered surveyor, to look out for a space, and he just sent me 445 Hackney Road

It looks to me to tick most boxes, and it's about 500m down the road.

• A large light industrial/warehouse unit within this modern purpose built building located on the popular Hackney Road

Benefiting from a large car park and loading bay to the rear with goods lift access to the basement.
Ground - 3,431 sq ft
Basement - 3,683 sq ft
Yard - 6,500 sq ft

 

RENT
£105,000 per annum
£14.75 per sq foot
AMENITIES
Own Entrance from Street
Gas Central Heating
Parking
Loading Bay
Goods Lift
Outside Congestion Zone
COMMUNICATIONS
A few minutes walk from Cambridge Heath and Bethnal Green stations and served by a number of bus routes around the city.
ACCOMMODATION
GROUND & BASEMENT
7,114 sq ft
662 sq m
 

[Samuel Keating-Fry]

On 21 November 2012 23:03, Russ Garrett <ru...@garrett.co.uk> wrote:
> So, Jonty and I went and scoped this place out today. It's pretty
> ideal. The highlights:
>
> - Two floors (ground and basement), each of which individually is
> larger than our current space.
> - Two loading bays, and our own lift.
> - Front door opens directly onto Hackney Road.
> - A massive car park to ourselves (shipping containers?)
>
> Pics are here:
> https://www.dropbox.com/sh/pkplwxy9vgz90ih/SBdGkmchjS
>
> Of course, the main issue is the price, but I think it's doable, at a
> stretch. Last time we moved, we managed to get a 320% uptick in
> membership revenue in the space of 3 months. If we can get half of
> that, we'll be able to afford it. There's also the possibility of
> partitioning off part of the space and subletting it while we build up
> enough cash.
>
> I'd much rather aim high and get somewhere awesome, rather than get
> somewhere we can comfortably afford and have to move again in a year's
> time.
>
> Thoughts?

Wow. This looks great guys!

It's probably worth asking whether they're ok with us putting in a
shipping container for bike storage.
I'm sure we'll have more bargaining power as prospective tenants than
after the paperwork is signed.

- S

[Russ Garrett]

On 22 November 2012 10:48, Samuel Keating-Fry <mister....@gmail.com> wrote:
> It's probably worth asking whether they're ok with us putting in a
> shipping container for bike storage.
> I'm sure we'll have more bargaining power as prospective tenants than
> after the paperwork is signed.

The guy who showed us around was fairly nonplussed with our mentions
of shipping containers and antennas, so I don't think they'll care.
May be a planning permission issue though.

--
Russ Garrett
ru...@garrett.co.uk

[tom]

Holy crap, it looks like i'd imagine a hackspace should look like (i.e. large ).

I'll up my membership for this

[Dave Ingram]

That looks awesome! I'd increase my membership for something of this scale, and possibly throw in a one-off moving donation.

I particularly like the idea of some sound isolation for the workshop, as angle grinding and hypnosis don't go together very well -- it's difficult to get people to focus and hear what you're saying!


D

On 15/11/12 21:13, 930913 wrote:

[Samuel Keating-Fry]

On 22 November 2012 12:09, Dave Ingram <da...@dmi.me.uk> wrote:
> That looks awesome! I'd increase my membership for something of this scale,
> and possibly throw in a one-off moving donation.
>

Yes. I'm not opposed to upping my membership for a few months or
making a one off donation if we need the extra cash for moving.

> I particularly like the idea of some sound isolation for the workshop, as
> angle grinding and hypnosis don't go together very well -- it's difficult to
> get people to focus and hear what you're saying!
>

Ha! I've head more that a couple of inductions begin with "Just relax
and listen to my voice. Try not to concentrate on the deafening noise
of the rage saw."

[Morris]

+1 increase membership for this.

bloody awesome building

On 22 November 2012 12:09, Dave Ingram <da...@dmi.me.uk> wrote:

--
>
++++++++++[>+>+++>++
+++++>++++++++++<<<<
-]>>>+++++++.>++++++
+++++.+++..---------
.++++++++++.<<+++.<.

[Toby Catlin]

I would move back to London for this space. Deffo worth a mandatory £30 a month

[Sam Kelly]

A mandatory £30 pcm would not be good for the social makeup of the
membership - there's no way I'd be able to afford to stay a member,
and nor would the rest of the benefit claimants & other really poor
members.

I'd certainly up my subscription, but pricing us out of it would feel
like a real dick move. I'm not even sure about the idea of a two-tier
system (£30+ waged/£7.50+ unwaged, for instance) but with the same
safeguards as we have now it would probably be OK.

[Toby Catlin]

Woah easy there, I just said it would be worth it

[David Murphy]

+1 on not upping the membership.

 

I could afford it no problem but there's quite a few people who contribute things other than money like time, effort, repairs and simply being interesting people doing interesting things without whom the space would be much worst off.

plus on the practical side of things of course it's total income we need to increase, not average income.

if we halved our membership numbers and doubled average membership fees paid then we'd be only worse off.

someone who pays £5 per month and almost never uses the space is good for the space and if we're moving to a larger space then more members is good as space for them isn't so much of an issue.

[Dave Ingram]

Just to head this off as early is possible... there is no talk of upping the required minimum membership fee, and no plans to do so. It was just a comment made by someone getting excited at the thought of the new space as to how valueable it would be to them.

Nothing to see here, move along :-)


D

[Will Beaufoy]

This looks great from the biohackers perspective.

Our aims over the next year are to get a bigger lab, and to get this lab certified for category 1 genetic modification. ("Activities of no or negligible risk, for which containment level 1 is appropriate to protect human health and the environment.")

So if we move to this new place, we're thinking of two options.

1) Designate a biohacking area (we'd ideally like somewhere at least the size of the current quiet room) as a part of the general space, open to everyone. Then once we've found out the requirements for this licence, we may ask to restrict access to the biohacking area it if this is required by the terms of the licence, or we may be able to get away with a locked freezer+cupboard. If we have to restrict access we may then want to sublet from the wider space.

2) Sublet a biohacking area from the space from the get-go. We restrict access to biohackers. Then we apply for the licence once we have the lab up to standard.

Both of these require at some point notifying the landlord that we're applying for this licence. We'd really like to find out now whether this is something they are likely to be ok with.

Russ, Jonty, anyone in touch with the landlord, can we check this with him?

[Charles Yarnold]

Yes, lets please leave this discussion to its own thread.

[Adrian Godwin]

There is strong feeling against upping the minimum. It's not likely.

However, voluntarily increasing your subs to whatever you can afford / feel it would be worth is pretty well essential if this is going to happen. We have seen a slow decline in the average subscription, even if you ignore the spike that allowed the current space to be opened.

Whether that's due to reductions, or an influx of people at low rates isn't important. What's important is that everyone who is able helps it rise again.

[SamLR]

22 November 2012 12:43, Dave Ingram <da...@dmi.me.uk> wrote:

Just to head this off as early is possible... there is no talk of upping the required minimum membership fee, and no plans to do so. It was just a comment made by someone getting excited at the thought of the new space as to how valueable it would be to them.

but if we set a minimum membership fee of £50,000/month then we only need member, and then they can sleep in all the space, and we can watch them steal bikes with the CCTV!

</troll>

Thanks, Dave, for the intercept. 

It looks like there's a good amount of community will to make this happen the next question is: what can we do to help make it happen, trustees? I know you're all just 'normal' members but you're more likely to know what the status is with respect to licensing (for biohackers and other exotica), money and moving (which only a very few people were around for the last time). 

So here's what I think we need to know:

1) How much money is required to make this happen (both in terms of one offs and long term), should we start a pledge?

2) What (if any) prep work can we do to make the space ready to move?

3) What else do we need to know and should we go and find out (e.g. moving companies, builders, insurance, utilities costs)?

4) What is the likely time scale for this

Thanks!

S

[Samuel Keating-Fry]

On 22 November 2012 12:43, Dave Ingram <da...@dmi.me.uk> wrote:
> Just to head this off as early is possible... there is no talk of upping the
> required minimum membership fee, and no plans to do so. It was just a
> comment made by someone getting excited at the thought of the new space as
> to how valueable it would be to them.
>
> Nothing to see here, move along :-)

Yes, I was thinking of a donation if required. Not mandatory increases
for all members.
We should find out how much extra money we actually need before
continuing down this path anyway.

[Russ Garrett]

On 22 November 2012 12:44, Will Beaufoy <william...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Russ, Jonty, anyone in touch with the landlord, can we check this with him?

I'd rather not terrify the landlord before he's signed the deal :).
It's quite possible that the lease wouldn't even require us to notify
the landlord anyway, in which case we'd be raising our profile for
nothing.

I really want the biohacking lab plan to work, but I think ultimately
any resistance to the GM certification by the landlord would not be a
deal-breaker for this space. (I also think that if this landlord is
against it, then it would be difficult to find somewhere which
wasn't.)

--
Russ Garrett
ru...@garrett.co.uk

[Russ Garrett]

On 22 November 2012 12:49, SamLR <sam.lind...@gmail.com> wrote:
> So here's what I think we need to know:
> 1) How much money is required to make this happen (both in terms of one offs
> and long term), should we start a pledge?

A lot of this depends on the overlap. We have a 3 month break clause
on our premises at Cremer Street. If we have to lease both premises
for three months then that's going to cost us a significant amount of
extra cash (nearly £30k). I have made enquiries to Workspace to ask if
we can reduce the break clause to one month, which they are
considering.

If that doesn't happen, the other possibility is to take the plunge
and issue notice on Cremer Street without a solid guarantee of a new
space. I don't want to do that.

To cover the increase in monthly running costs, we'll need to
approximately double our membership revenue. When we moved into Cremer
Street, we increased revenue by 300% in four months, so this doesn't
sound like a totally unreasonable target.

The last issue is the one-off costs of deposit, and renovation costs.
If the new place has a 3-month deposit, then that's going to be £30k.
(We have £12k in the bank.) We will receive £7k deposit back from
Workspace, but not until after we've had to pay the deposit on 445. We
may have to take a loan out to cover this.

> 3) What else do we need to know and should we go and find out (e.g. moving
> companies, builders, insurance, utilities costs)?

I suspect we can do the moving ourself. One Luton for two days, couple
of hundred quid. We will need to spend about £1k getting the front
door up to a reasonably secure standard. Other things include
ventilation for the workshop.

> 4) What is the likely time scale for this

As soon as practical. We can't be more precise until we know about the
break clause.

--
Russ Garrett
ru...@garrett.co.uk

[Dario]

Russ,

I recommend also leveraging the "soft" benefits of letting the property as a HackSpace to the owner. Worldwide visibility and free publicity for the property, making it the hub of the new emerging new manufacturing industry, etc.

If I was looking to rent a space I would definitely rather pursue an innovative business model than a traditional "sweatshop"! ;-)

Just my 2 "seller" cents
Dario

[Martin Dittus]

I added a FAQ section to the wiki page because certain discussions already keep repeating. Feel free to amend.

http://wiki.london.hackspace.org.uk/view/New_Space_Search_2012#Frequently_Asked_Questions

m.

[Martin (Crypt)]

I would be strongly against raising the membership, but I think a pledge drive would work, i would give to it.  Possibly a general mailout to all members explaining the situation (yes there are probably a lot that don't reguarly read this).  Also maybe make a suggested donation more promenent.  At the moment it might be that people default to paying £5 a month because we tell them that number, if we say we suggest £20 a month (or any other figure), to people when they join, we might get more that way.  Just an idea

[Ryan Seville]

Looks awesome, I would be able to contribute to a pledge if one was made.

[Funkenstein]

Speaking for the Biohackers, I say this is a great space and we'd be happy to relocate there with the rest of the Hackspace. As our group increased a lot lately, we cannot all fit in our tiny lab anymore and were considering finding a bigger space but were not keen on cutting the umbilical cord with the rest of you guys. If we could have a bigger room in the new space it'd be the best solution and I guess we'd be willing to contribute with a one-off moving donation.

[Jean-Baptiste Thiebaut]

Thanks Russ and Jonty for doing this.

If we can have a music studio (for the Music Hackspace and music workshops, and other things), that would be great.
Happy to help/consult/motivate to build the thing.

Best,
Jean-Baptiste

On 21 Nov 2012, at 23:03, Russ Garrett <ru...@garrett.co.uk> wrote:

> So, Jonty and I went and scoped this place out today. It's pretty
> ideal. The highlights:
>
> - Two floors (ground and basement), each of which individually is
> larger than our current space.
> - Two loading bays, and our own lift.
> - Front door opens directly onto Hackney Road.
> - A massive car park to ourselves (shipping containers?)
>
> Pics are here:
> https://www.dropbox.com/sh/pkplwxy9vgz90ih/SBdGkmchjS
>
> Of course, the main issue is the price, but I think it's doable, at a
> stretch. Last time we moved, we managed to get a 320% uptick in
> membership revenue in the space of 3 months. If we can get half of
> that, we'll be able to afford it. There's also the possibility of
> partitioning off part of the space and subletting it while we build up
> enough cash.
>
> I'd much rather aim high and get somewhere awesome, rather than get
> somewhere we can comfortably afford and have to move again in a year's
> time.
>
> Thoughts?
>
>

> On 19 November 2012 16:59, Tom Sands <itst...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> 16:53 <@jontyw> Right. I will wear a pink cheerleaders skirt if we raise
>> enough money to move to this place, or somewhere similar, in the next six
>> months.
>>
>> Posting this here for the record. We finally have a fundraising goal worth
>> earning towards!
>
>
>
> --
> Russ Garrett
> ru...@garrett.co.uk

[Peter "Sci" Turpin]

> The last issue is the one-off costs of deposit, and renovation costs.
> If the new place has a 3-month deposit, then that's going to be £30k.
> (We have £12k in the bank.) We will receive £7k deposit back from
> Workspace, but not until after we've had to pay the deposit on 445. We
> may have to take a loan out to cover this.

Assuming everyone could, £18k extra is only £33 each, once-off.
I doubt everyone has the free funds, but if everyone puts in a tenner
that's still a £5k+ boost.

If we could get members to cover what we'd get back from the Cramer St
deposit, once the move was done we could put the deposit into some new
equipment. Then members don't fret about money going toward a
non-material cost.

>> 3) What else do we need to know and should we go and find out (e.g. moving
>> companies, builders, insurance, utilities costs)?
>
> I suspect we can do the moving ourself. One Luton for two days, couple
> of hundred quid. We will need to spend about £1k getting the front
> door up to a reasonably secure standard. Other things include
> ventilation for the workshop.

How many do we have licensed to drive Lutons?



PS: Milkfloat. /troll

[Russ Garrett]

On 22 November 2012 15:54, Peter "Sci" Turpin <s...@sci-fi-fox.com> wrote:
> How many do we have licensed to drive Lutons?

The Luton is the largest van you can drive on a standard (B1) license.

--
Russ Garrett
ru...@garrett.co.uk

[Philip McGaw]

That is any one with a standard car licence.

just keep the entire thing below 3.5 tons.

while it is more "interesting" to drive than a car, any one who has about 50,000 miles of car driving under their belt will be ok with them,

-- 

07969 502 077 | phi...@mcgaw.eu | http://philipmcgaw.com | http://skippy.org.uk
Twitter: http://twitter.com/skippyuk | LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/philipmcgaw

“Do you consider yourself a magician, or sorcerer, or mage, or whatever else?
Do you practice magic every day?
If your answer is no, why not? No time? No energy?

If you have no time, throw a brick through your television, take a sledgehammer to your computer, burn your pornography. Shun everyone who does not contribute to your life in a meaningful and positive way. We fill our lives with so many distractions that we forget to live. Everyone has been guilty of this. If you have no energy, eliminate the thieves who steal your energy. When you die will you regret that you didn't work as much overtime as you could have, or that you missed out on life because you were tired from working overtime? There's a world waiting to be born. It would be a shame if you were too tired or too busy to help us birth it.” — Chaos Current  

[Jonty Wareing]

Afternoon hackers, I bring news of numbers and great joy!

Following on from the previous thread about using DATA and SCIENCE
to figure out what effect this would have on our members, I extracted
the postcode for every account registered on the hackspace website
(both members and lapsed members), then grabbed public transit travel
time to both the old and new space for every member at 7pm on a
Tuesday.

A basic average of the data results in an overall two minute increase
in travel time for the hackspace hivemind if we move to 445.

If you'd like to play with the data yourself, it's available here:
http://jonty.co.uk/bits/cremer_vs_445_travel_times.txt

Each row is from the postcode of a hackspace member to either Cremer
Street (current space) or 445 Hackney Road (new space). The travel
time is in seconds. Obviously I'm not publishing the postcodes.

Now break out your visualisation foo and show us pretty things.

--jonty

[Samuel Keating-Fry]

On 22 November 2012 16:50, Jonty Wareing <jo...@jonty.co.uk> wrote:
> Afternoon hackers, I bring news of numbers and great joy!
>
> Following on from the previous thread about using DATA and SCIENCE
> to figure out what effect this would have on our members, I extracted
> the postcode for every account registered on the hackspace website
> (both members and lapsed members), then grabbed public transit travel
> time to both the old and new space for every member at 7pm on a
> Tuesday.
>
> A basic average of the data results in an overall two minute increase
> in travel time for the hackspace hivemind if we move to 445.
>
> If you'd like to play with the data yourself, it's available here:
> http://jonty.co.uk/bits/cremer_vs_445_travel_times.txt
>
> Each row is from the postcode of a hackspace member to either Cremer
> Street (current space) or 445 Hackney Road (new space). The travel
> time is in seconds. Obviously I'm not publishing the postcodes.
>
> Now break out your visualisation foo and show us pretty things.
>
> --jonty
>

ha! i was literally just making the same thing :-)

[Nigel Worsley]

Your numbers are a little suspect.

If it is possible to walk between the two spaces in 15 minutes then
that should be the maximum time difference, but the figures show
a maximum time increase of 29:27 and a maximum reduction of
17:48.

They also show that only 2 people have a longer journey than me,
which looks like complete bollocks. Ealing puts me further away
than most, but the 3rd furthest???

325 people would save time and 687 would have a longer journey
if the figures are a reliable indicator (which I rather doubt).

Nigle

[Dave Ingram]

On 22/11/12 17:22, Nigel Worsley wrote:
> Your numbers are a little suspect.
>
> If it is possible to walk between the two spaces in 15 minutes then
> that should be the maximum time difference, but the figures show
> a maximum time increase of 29:27 and a maximum reduction of
> 17:48.

Ah, but if that's just based on public transport data, it could ignore
walking times? For example, it could be much quicker for someone to get
to Bethnal Green rather than changing etc to get to Hoxton station.

Jonty: What parameters did you use for the public transit time? And
where did the data come from? I guess what I'm trying to say is
[citation needed] ;-)


D

[Kimball Johnson]

> They also show that only 2 people have a longer journey than me,
> which looks like complete bollocks. Ealing puts me further away
> than most, but the 3rd furthest???

It is only london postcodes.

Kimball

[Jonty Wareing]

> Jonty: What parameters did you use for the public transit time? And
> where did the data come from? I guess what I'm trying to say is
> [citation needed] ;-)

This is using google transit data, for a journey at 7pm on a Tuesday.

Looking at the actual time is likely to result in confusion, these
should only be compared against one another to see the difference.

If you're looking for your own postcode: These were limited to people
living within London postcodes (which excluded about 100 entries from
all over the country), and not every member actually has their address
listed on their hackspace profile. Some addresses were missing
postcodes too.

--jonty

[Jonty Wareing]

> If it is possible to walk between the two spaces in 15 minutes then
> that should be the maximum time difference, but the figures show
> a maximum time increase of 29:27 and a maximum reduction of
> 17:48.

You assume a perfect routing algorithm. They never are.

> They also show that only 2 people have a longer journey than me,
> which looks like complete bollocks. Ealing puts me further away
> than most, but the 3rd furthest???

I filtered the postcodes for people in London, as there were
postcodes all over the country, which is not useful data.

> 325 people would save time and 687 would have a longer journey
> if the figures are a reliable indicator (which I rather doubt).

They're as reliable as google directions generally, as they came
directly from that API.

--jonty

[Martin Dittus]

First pass: a histogram of the change in travel time, grouped into 1-minute slots.

The vertical axis shows the percentage of members (current & former) that will be subject to the particular change in travel time.

m.

[Jonty Wareing]

Follow up:

Histogram of travel times to the current space (X = Minutes, Y = People
who would travel for that time):

http://bit.ly/WCBF3s

And the same for the new space:

http://bit.ly/SXTmnQ

Everything shifts to the right by a couple of minutes as expected, aside
from some lucky people who seem to have a travel time under 3mins.

I removed one person with a travel time of 243 minutes, as they made the
graphs unreadable.

[Martin Dittus]

In case your mail client just stripped that image attachment: here's a link.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/dekstop/8208226567

m.

> <change-hist.png>

[Peter "Sci" Turpin]

On 22/11/2012 09:35, Russ Garrett wrote:
> On 22 November 2012 00:35, Peter "Sci" Turpin <s...@sci-fi-fox.com> wrote:
>> Didn't someone mention upstairs space already having been rented? Presumably
>> they get a cut of car-park space and may have noise demands to keep them
>> friendly? Or do they just get the front parking spaces?
>
> There are two other floors in the building, but they have their own
> separate car park (and entrance). The car park in those pictures would
> be exclusively ours.
>
>> If the car-park is exclusively for the ground-floor use, it looks easily
>> large enough we could afford to sublet a few spaces to upper units for
>> parking perhaps (just an off the cuff idea). A little extra cash in the
>> pockets, and a lower chance of any complaints from them on occasion of any
>> issues.
>
> This is a possibility, but we'd need to consider how to limit access.

Well I have the ground-loop vehicle sensor relays from an old car-park
barrier system, and a couple of mains linear actuators from a medical
bed.. oh, and two traffic lights.

[Sue Spence]

On Thursday, November 22, 2012 1:46:13 PM UTC, Russ Garrett wrote:

As soon as practical. We can't be more precise until we know about the
break clause.

I'd be very interested in helping make this happen.  Where is the pledge page?  :-) 

[Bioni Samp]

Hi I just read this thread with interest and what I would recommend as someone who has worked for councils in the past is to approach Hackney Council and say you are providing a essential community service and do they have any spare properties which could be offered at a discount for HS use. Hope this is of help in getting a rent cap. Possibly offer free training for a certain amount of hours per year to Hackney residents in lew of a £1,000 peppercorn rent. It can be done :) good luck :) B

On Thursday, 15 November 2012 21:13:26 UTC, 930913 wrote:

I asked my father, a chartered surveyor, to look out for a space, and he just sent me 445 Hackney Road

It looks to me to tick most boxes, and it's about 500m down the road.

• A large light industrial/warehouse unit within this modern purpose built building located on the popular Hackney Road

Benefiting from a large car park and loading bay to the rear with goods lift access to the basement.
Ground - 3,431 sq ft
Basement - 3,683 sq ft
Yard - 6,500 sq ft

 

RENT
£105,000 per annum
£14.75 per sq foot
AMENITIES
Own Entrance from Street
Gas Central Heating
Parking
Loading Bay
Goods Lift
Outside Congestion Zone
COMMUNICATIONS
A few minutes walk from Cambridge Heath and Bethnal Green stations and served by a number of bus routes around the city.
ACCOMMODATION
GROUND & BASEMENT
7,114 sq ft
662 sq m
 

[Mark Steward]

Hey, thanks for the offer!  I'd be interested to know what you can find out from them, because we didn't manage to even get discount on business rates from Hackney.  That said, the new place is in Tower Hamlets, who may be more interested in community projects.

Mark

[Ben Barwise]

Just an idea, it seems the parking space half of the rent? could their be an option to only take a portion of it?

[Mike Harrison]

On Fri, 23 Nov 2012 12:01:06 +0000, you wrote:

>Just an idea, it seems the parking space half of the rent? could their be
>an option to only take a portion of it?
>

If that's the case then maybe subletting would be a more flexible option as the allocation between
HS and sublet space could be adjusted over time according to finances. Also you could make
arrangements like working-hours only lets so there is more space for HS use at evenings/weekends

[Ben Barwise]

The issue of sub-letting is liability though, if the sub-tenant pulls out it is a massive issue. If you can persuade a landlord to divide a space its much easier yet hard to negotiate.

[Mike Harrison]

On Fri, 23 Nov 2012 13:28:03 +0000, you wrote:

>The issue of sub-letting is liability though, if the sub-tenant pulls out
>it is a massive issue. If you can persuade a landlord to divide a space its
>much easier yet hard to negotiate.

True but I doubt you'd have any shortage of new takers for reasonably secure daytime parking spaces
in Hackney, say on 1-month or 3-month rentals to minimise admin.

[Clare Greenhalgh]

Just wondered if you could do the letting of the spaces on a pre-paid letting arrangement, with a code to get in that expires at the end of the specified time. 

That way you don't need to worry as much about the sub-letting (but not 100% sure this is legal!) and are much more secure about the money you have coming in!

Just an idea,

Noko

[Russ Garrett]

We visited 445 Hackney Road again yesterday, and I got some more
photos with a better camera:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/russss/sets/72157632122729809/

--
Russ Garrett
ru...@garrett.co.uk

[Nigel Worsley]

> We visited 445 Hackney Road again yesterday, and I got some more
> photos with a better camera:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/russss/8227380869/in/set-72157632122729809/

We haven't even signed the lease yet but we ALREADY have people bringing
bikes into the space!

Nigle

[930913]

Don't worry, it's a brompton, so it'll fold up when inside :D

Solexious, video? :p

[SamLR]

Is there a floor plan anywhere or could someone who's been there sketch something out just so the rest of us have an idea how everything fits together?

S

[Russ Garrett]

On 29 November 2012 11:10, SamLR <sam.lind...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Is there a floor plan anywhere or could someone who's been there sketch
> something out just so the rest of us have an idea how everything fits
> together?

We don't currently have a floor plan, but the basic situation is
simply two large rooms (with some fiddly bits around the edges). Based
on the improved measurements taken yesterday, the ground floor is 3125
sq ft and the basement is 3390 sq ft.

--
Russ Garrett
ru...@garrett.co.uk

[Peter "Sci" Turpin]

The big M on the front door could be easily repainted into a huge H.