By Chris Guy posted on 12 Apr 2019 in Urban

At the end of March I was fortunate to get a quick tour of the demolition work being carried out by Kier of Bristol’s former sorting office at Temple Meads. The structure, which has been derelict since 1997, is being demolished to make way for the new Bristol University Temple Quarter Enterprise Campus.

The building sits right next to the railway tracks and opposite platform 15 of Bristol Temple Meads station and as a result no explosives are being used in the demolition process. Instead the structure is being eaten away by two giant ‘nibblers’.

Below is a selection of the images that I took during my visit. Hopefully these give a sense of the scale of the building and site itself, which is hard to gauge until you get close up. Note, you can see how the building looked in 2017 in one of my previous blog posts.

Black and white image of a partially demolished concrete building, rubble, excavators and skips on a construction site beneath a cloudy sky.

View from the site office

Derelict concrete industrial building covered in graffiti, surrounded by rubble, puddles and harsh sunlight.

Spray used to keep the dust down

Black-and-white image of a derelict multi-storey concrete building, collapsed sections and piles of rubble and twisted metal in the foreground beneath a partly cloudy sky.

Steels piled ready for recycling

Excavator on a demolition site dismantling a partly demolished industrial building with graffiti, surrounded by rubble under a bright sky.

Demolition of the Bristol Sorting Office

Orange long-reach excavator on a cleared construction site, tracks on compacted ground beside piles of rubble under a bright, contrail-streaked sky.

One of the two ‘nibblers’ used in the demolition

Woman in a hard hat and high-visibility jacket stands amid stacked steel beams and rubble at a demolition site, smiling towards the camera.

A soil sampling expert on site

Black-and-white image of the Bristol Sorting Office, exposed floors and pillars rising above a rough, empty forecourt under a streaked sky.

Empty shell of the former sorting office

A worker in a high-visibility jacket and hard hat surveys rubble beside a partly demolished concrete building under a blue sky with vapour trails.

Damon, the site manager

Partly demolished multi-storey concrete building on a demolition site, surrounded by rubble, timber and debris under a blue sky.

Partial demolition of the former sorting office

Rubble-strewn demolition site with a partially demolished multi-storey concrete building beneath a blue sky streaked with contrails.

Rubble and Rebar

Derelict industrial building amid demolition, heaps of rubble and exposed rebar in the foreground, graffiti on crumbling concrete walls beneath a blue sky.

Demolition detail

Derelict concrete building under demolition beside railway tracks and platforms, with a crane, brick wall, grassy embankment and blue sky streaked with contrails.

The demolition site is close to railway tracks and platform 15 at Bristol Temple Meads

Demolition site with rubble piles, excavators and site cabins, fenced perimeter, a blue sky and a bridge and town on the distant horizon.

Looking over the site towards Totterdown

Partially demolished multi-storey concrete building with exposed floors and graffiti, surrounded by rubble and safety barriers under a pale blue sky.

Soon to be gone

Thank you

Thanks to the Kier Construction for providing access. All images on this page are Copyright © Chris Guy and should not be used without permission. For usage please get in touch.

Tagged with:
bristol brutalist

↵ stories