Members may be interested, and perhaps rather sad, to hear that the East wing of Crawley Court (as pictured on our home page) has been put up for sale or rent, while Arqiva will continue to occupy the West wing. Many NTLPA members will have either worked at Crawley Court or visited this iconic building. For details on this see https://www.lsh.co.uk/find/properties/hampshire/winchester/2050040.
The building was constructed between 1972 and 1973, on the site of a former country house, as the new Engineering Headquarters for the Independent Broadcasting Authority, who moved there in October 1973. The IBA had responsibility for the construction and operation of the broadcasting systems for independent tv (ITV and Channel 4) as well as Independent Local Radio. There was an offical visit by Queen Elizabeth and the Duke of Edinburgh in November 1975.
In 1991 IBA Engineering was privatised as National Transcommunications Limited (subsequently shortened to NTL!), then purchased by cable company CableTel who took over the NTL brand. Acquisition, over time, of almost all of the UK cable companies then followed and finally rebranding as Virgin Media. However, over this time some parts of the company were spun off, including the broadcasting of ITV, C4 and ILR, which was renamed as Arqiva and who continued to occupy Crawley Court.
It seems that Arqiva will continue to occupy part of the site but now no longer require it all – hence the proposed disposal.
There is an interesting history of the Crawley Court site by Mike Lambert at https://www.crawleyvillagehall.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Crawley-Court-History.pdf and also in the Members’ Gallery on this site.