 Site Records
Site Name:Dartford Borough Council Emergency Centre
Civic Centre
Home Gardens
Dartford, Kent
OS Grid Ref: TQ543743
Sub Brit site visit 5th November 2003
The Dartford
Borough Council Emergency Centre is located beneath the Civic Centre
in Prior Road Dartford although it isn't underground.
The Emergency Centre is a late build, being completed in 1991 and replacing
the previous emergency centre which consisted of two rooms in the basement
of the Orchard Theatre in Dartford.
One wing of the Civic Centre was built on stilts, the area under the
offices being used as a staff car park. One section of this car park
was filled in forming the new emergency centre.
The main entrance into the emergency centre is from the ground floor
of the Civic Centre where there is an ordinary door into a large liaison
room; there is no blast or fallout protection at this point. The room
is now used as a general office by the council. There is a small ECN
switchboard on a desk in one corner but no EMP protected cabinet. Apparently
the phone rings regularly and the staff in the room have been instructed
not to answer it.
On the far side of the room there are two doors, one leads into a small
room which might have been the communications room while the other leads
into the larger control room. This is still equipped for use as an emergency
centre with local and regional maps on the walls but there are no computer
terminals and nowhere to plug them in.
Both this and the adjacent liaison room have large windows and in the
event of a nuclear or gas attack there is a stack of concrete shutters
that could be fitted over the windows. These are stored at a council
depot elsewhere in the Borough.
From the other side of the control room a door leads to a short corridor
and the emergency exit which in the event of an attack would be used
as the main entrance into the emergency centre. At the far end of the
corridor is a steel and concrete blast door and beyond it a wooden door
into the car park.
On one side of the corridor is a well equipped kitchen
with a Viscount cooker, Toshiba microwave oven, Beko fridge, Electrolux
freezer, hot water dispenser, stainless steel sink and draining board
and wood kitchen units. The room also has a window looking into the
car park. On the other side of the corridor is the plant room with electrical
switchgear and a standby generator that only serves the emergency centre.
There is also ventilation and filtration plant that feeds concealed
trunking in the ceiling of the two main rooms.
Although Dartford's emergency centre is available for use the emergency
planning team prefer to use their ordinary offices because of the lack
of computer terminals in the emergency centre.
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Last updated 9th November 2003
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