Treloar School and College, Hampshire

A collaborative approach from two of the UK’s leading building and access companies is literally opening doors for young people in wheelchairs at a specialist School and College in Hampshire.

Osborne, a leader in the education building sector, asked GEZE UK to help create a bespoke access solution for Treloar School and College in Hampshire, which caters for residential and day students from the age of 7 to 25 with a range of physical disabilities and associated learning difficulties.

The new £20million national centre of excellence needed to be secure, and it clearly needed to be highly accessible in accordance with the Equality Act, but the developers wanted to go even further. When looking at controlled access solutions which used swipe cards to authorise entry, Osborne and GEZE UK recognised that many of the college’s wheelchair-bound students were in fact swifter around campus than their peers and that this standard system would hamper their ability to get around quickly. It was decided that each wheelchair would be fitted with a proximity tag, which would open doors throughout the campus as the student approached, reducing the need for them to stop at entrances.

GEZE UK’s Slimdrive SF operators were integrated with a special access control system, which meant that the proximity tags would pre-trigger the radar on each automatic door, ensuring it opened in time. Able-bodied users would continue to use a regular swipe tag system. Folding doors were chosen to maximise the opening width of each entrance, essential for busy areas.

The Slimdrive SF was ideal for the educational environment as its high performance motor ensures the doors open smoothly, while being highly efficient and quiet. Its safety features include built-in finger guards and safety sensors. As part of GEZE’s Slimdrive range, the SF is also just 7cm high, which means it can be discreetly fitted.