What an odd project - they have just created a replica of their old interface. Leads me to think that they have selected a new supplier for the hosting and told them to 'copy the site', presumably a commercially motivated selection pure and simple. It beggars belief that such lame performance would not have been apparent during final testing and no doubt the old providers are killing themselves laughing now.
Ugly as hell but the old site had immense performance and it just shows the risks of messing with something that works. According to rumour I beileve the old site was built by students for next to nothing.