development

You are currently browsing the archive for the development category.

Dickie Lewis plans afoot already

February 25, 2010 in buildings, development by Martin | No comments

Lewis’s has only recently announced its closure, but already plans sneaking out about what will come after it. Still no word on whether the shop itself will be ‘resurgent’ in the new development, but plenty of comment, so I’ll leave to to pop over to those sites for a read.

Plans for a ‘Central Village‘ have been on the cards for a few years already.

Robin Brown on the Liverpool Culture Blog is right to worry about what will go in the new ‘Central Village Liverpool’ . What with Liverpool One and the new developments from Paradise Street up to Renshaw Street, Liverpool is at risk from each area pulling customers away the others. If this development is to work, it will have to have its own distinctive character.

However optimistic we are, Liverpool has only got so much money to spend, especially at the moment. As this is near Lime Street, there is a good chance Central Village will attract visitors from outside the city, but if it apes the rest of the new developments, Liverpool will lose its character, and it’s often bold independent shopping soul.

Good luck to it.

Post to Twitter Tweet This Post Post to Delicious Delicious Post to Digg Digg This Post Post to Facebook Facebook Post to StumbleUpon Stumble This Post

Tags: ,

New Museum is empty, Liverpool Map goes on display, work begins on Liverpool’s Garden Festival site

February 15, 2010 in Museums, development by Martin | No comments

Photo of side of the New Museum of Liverpool based at Pier Head Liverpool.

New Museum Liverpool, by pixiepic, via Flickr

The keys were handed over to National Museums Liverpool from the developers last week, and now the pristine Museum of Liverpool is preparing for the installation of its exhibits ahead of the 2011 opening. The Liverpool Echo has a great slideshow of the museum, including the main entrance, the giant picture window, and the central spiral staircase.

You can also sponsor part of the Jura stone cladding, or one of the seats in the auditorium. Just pop over to www.liverpool museums.org.uk/about/development/mol for more information.

I’m looking forward to seeing it when it opens!

Liverpool Map to go on display

Speaking of the museum, a new fused glass map which will take pride of place in the galleries when MoL opens next year is to go on display at the Daily Post’s offices in the city centre. There’s a blog on the Daily Post web site to keep you up to date with progress with the map.

Now if only they’d do an electronic version I could stick on my site!

Work begins on the International Garden Festival site.

After 26 years, work is finally to start on the site of the 1984 Garden Festival. The Oriental gardens will be restored, lakes dredged and undergrowth cleared. Plenty of people in the Liverpool Echo article are ‘delighted’ at the ‘milestone’. 600 homes were built straight after the Festival, and Pleasure Island gave many a young schoolkid a fun Bank Holiday in the 1990s, but developers Langtree hope that this latest phase of building will create a worthy leisure facility for Merseyside and kick-start the collapsed apartment project from 2008.

Post to Twitter Tweet This Post Post to Delicious Delicious Post to Digg Digg This Post Post to Facebook Facebook Post to StumbleUpon Stumble This Post

Tags: , ,

Criticism for Liverpool regeneration plans, and new blog on Liverpool’s lost historic buildings

February 10, 2010 in Blogs, buildings, development by Martin | No comments

Photo of West Tower, Brook Street Liverpool, as viewed from the Seacombe promenade

West Tower, Brook Street, Liverpool, by E Pollock via Geograph

We’ve moved a step closer to Peel’s vision of ‘Liverpool Waters’ with funding being secured for the 54 storey Richmond Properties/Y1 tower towards the north docks, at the junction of the Strand and Leeds Street. It’s 25m taller than the current tallest tower, Tower West, but has been redesigned (again) after a failed attempt at getting planning permission in 2007.

Having failed to get the sleek design past the Council planning committee, it seems that the architects have thrown a bucket of Sticklebricks at the south side, to see what sticks (check out the third pic in the slideshow via the link above). Comments in the Architect’s Journal include the terms ‘pig ugly’, ‘hubris’ and ’shoebox’ (though the third of these is a Wayne Colquhoun comment, so pinches of salt all round).

CABE criticise Pathfinder scheme

Further criticism for Liverpool’s attempts at regeneration come from Colquhoun’s arch enemies, the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE). The commission has hit out at the New Heartlands Housing Market Renewal scheme, particularly parking courts and the quality of housing. SAVE’s Will Palin added to the judgment, claiming that “swathes of good Victorian terraced housing been emptied and left to rot”, to be replaced by inferior buildings.

New Pictorial History of Liverpool

OK, enough about planning for now. Adrian McEwen (via Twitter) pointed out the new Streets of Liverpool website.

This blog brings you views of Liverpool from across the 19th and 20th Centuries, with a paragraph or two about what you can see in the photos. The February 8th post is all about Lost Churches of Liverpool, which is a kind of post-script to the 2001 book The Churches of Liverpool by David Lewis, which was published by the blog author.

It’s great to see some little admissions of what the publisher would have liked to have done better in the book (an index, for example), but to make up for this (perhaps!) future blog posts will give us photos of the greatest losses to the city, starting with St George’s Church, which stood where Liverpool Castle once was, and where now we find the Victoria Monument.

The most recent post as of this writing does a similar service to other lost Liverpool buildings, including arguably the most-missed: the Customs House, which was needlessly demolished in the post-Blitz redevelopment.

Make sure you keep an eye on this new blog – it promises to be a good one!

Post to Twitter Tweet This Post Post to Delicious Delicious Post to Digg Digg This Post Post to Facebook Facebook Post to StumbleUpon Stumble This Post

Tags: , , , , , , , ,

Liverpool photo competition, and Local Development Framework

February 4, 2010 in development, planning, preservation by Martin | No comments

Liverpool Skyline by jimmmedia via Flickr

Liverpool skyline shows the new and the old bidding for space (by jimmedia via Flickr)

The Art in Liverpool blog has news that English Heritage and Liverpool City Council (as part of the Historic Environment of Liverpool Project) are running a competition to contribute to the Shanghai Expo 2010.

The theme of the competition is ‘Your Liverpool’, and you can enter by submitting a photo or about 100 words on the topic.

The 10 shortlisted entries will earn their creators a chance to work with digital designers to produce short pieces on ‘their city of Liverpool’. The pieces will then be shown in the Liverpool pavilion at the Expo later this year. Closing date is 22nd  February.

Future of Liverpool

On the City Council website today is news of a Local Development Framework (LDF) to guide the future development of the city. The plan has been released for a public consultation.

The most relevant of the seven main features for readers of this blog is “Protecting  important historic buildings”. As all Liverpool residents past and present will  know, the city has an amazing array of listed and other historic buildings, particularly in Dale Street, Castle Street and the Lime Street/William Brown Street area. It has also seen a great deal needlessly lost.

So get onto the Council site and have a look at the LDF documents, and have your say at one of the local events!

Post to Twitter Tweet This Post Post to Delicious Delicious Post to Digg Digg This Post Post to Facebook Facebook Post to StumbleUpon Stumble This Post

Tags: , ,

Docks, Drinking Dens and Development Committees

December 15, 2009 in development, planning by Martin | No comments

Liverpool Waters image by Jaybuoy

Liverpool Waters image by Jaybuoy

Peel’s Liverpool Waters scheme has reached another milestone with their plans for Birkenhead Docks being submitted to the local council. The Northbank east section has already been approved, but this East Float part is apparently the UK’s largest planning application.

Peel hopes the Mersey estuary will rival Shanghai and Sydney once the development is completed, and the artists’ impressions I’ve seen certainly show a massive change from what the area looks like now.

Perhaps I’m being old-fashioned, or at least conservative, but to me this will completely change the character of Liverpool and the Wirral. I’m not opposed to big cities per se, but what I love about Liverpool is the human scale of it all. Say what you want about the Mann Island development and the new Liverpool Museum, but the size (if not the design) of these buildings fit with the character of Liverpool. So does Liverpool One. The forest of skyscrapers promised by Peel will remove that feeling, and alter the balance and focus of the river bank. No longer will the Three Graces be the prow of the good ship Liverpool. All eyes will be on Peelsville.

I’d dearly love to see the vast swathes of dereliction in Liverpool and Birkenhead brought back into use (see for instance my earlier posts on Stanley Dock). But whether historic buildings are brought into use or new development takes place, I’m sure there are better, more individual ways of doing it. Discussions on Yo! Liverpool certainly show enthusiasm for the project, although there are some who want tougher questions asked.

Perhaps the new version of Liverpool – Peel’s version – will be a hugely exciting place to live and work, but I fear that I’ll feel a little lost in it all. The plans concentrate in the north docks, so perhaps both towns can successfully contain their ’scraper cities’. What do you think?

Liverpool’s own scrutiny committee

Speaking of my recent Stanley Dock article, I was contacted by Peter Baines, Local Government Improvement Adviser for English Heritage, who pointed me in the direction of Liverpool City Council’s Regeneration Select Committee. Peter tells me that “these committees hold in-depth reviews on all manner of policy areas and make recommendations to the Council’s Executive / Cabinet about how things can be improved”. This page shows how open this committee is, with agendas and minutes posted for all their meetings. The page also lists their responsibilities, which to me look like exactly the kind of progress and development we should be after.

Thanks, David! Good to know we have these committees!

When Christmas shopping gets a bit much…

Liverpool.com has a great little article on the best pubs and bars to be found in the city centre. From the Grapes and Carnaevon Castle to the Richmond and the Globe, the list gives away some hidden gems in Liverpool’s pub landscape. Have you tried any?

Liverpool Landscapes and Historic Liverpool go social!

If you’re a regular reader (and if not, why not?!) then you may have noticed the headlines in the left-hand bar. These are my posts on the new Historic Liverpool Twitter page! Click straight through to the stories from this blog, or follow all the updates at @histliverpool.

You can also keep an eye on all the links used in this blog by going to the Historic Liverpool Delicious page. This is a site where I can publicly bookmark interesting pages, and keep them collected in one place.

Both these pages can be viewed without opening an account, and you can keep up to date with each page by adding their URLs (Delicious, Twitter) to a feed reader.

Post to Twitter Tweet This Post Post to Delicious Delicious Post to Digg Digg This Post Post to Facebook Facebook Post to StumbleUpon Stumble This Post

Tags: , , , , ,

Liverpool’s Redundant Buildings (or, What future for Stanley Dock and friends?)

November 26, 2009 in buildings, conservation, development, planning, restoration by Martin | No comments

Stanley Dock, by Tim.Edwards

Stanley Dock, by Tim.Edwards, via Flickr

There has been a certain amount of interest in my post on re-using Liverpool’s derelict buildings and in particular the derelict tobacco warehouse at Stanley Dock, which many (me included) would like to see regenerated. A few questions remain, such as the problem of too-low ceilings (are they too low? How low is too low?). If this is a problem, are there any other uses to which the huge building could be put (See ‘Stanley Dock Tobacco Warehouse below)?

There is also of course the larger problem of the isolation of the warehouse and other buildings down that part of the city. It’s handy for the town centre, but a little too far to walk, but possibly not worth driving in.

We could sit around here all day discussing the problems of regenerating the warehouse area, but I’d like to keep the focus on the wider issue of the redevelopment and re-use of derelict buildings, of which there are many around Merseyside. There are other cities in the country who have already taken up the challenge. Four of them are mentioned in the English Heritage (EH) publication Making the Most of Your Local Heritage: A Guide for Overview and Scrutiny Committees, downloadable from the HELM website (and which actually has a photo of our own fair city on the cover).

Although the booklet is aimed at those already involved in local heritage and planning issues, any of us can take its advice on how to make the most of our historic landscape and the buildings in it. Of particular interest is Case Study 3, Wolverhampton and Heritage at Risk: Protecting the Irreplacable (can you see where this is going? ;) ).

A quote:

Wolverhampton City Council recognised the considerable potential of redundant historic buildings when in 2004 a scrutiny panel was established to investigate how an increasingly uninhabited historic environment could be used as an effective impetus for regeneration. The review attracted widespread attention amongst the local press and community as the Panel sought to establish how new uses could be found for a significant number of historic buildings…

Their report found that a crucial factor for success was the partnership between the City Council and developers, and recommended a set of character appraisals for important sites and other areas at risk. Could this be a solution for Liverpool? Does Liverpool have a similar process or committee? And what role can local residents play in the absence of such organisations? (Check out the advice for Heritage Champions on the HELM website).

Stanley Dock Tobacco Warehouse

I’ve found an old Liverpool Echo story referring to plans to regenerate the whole warehouse area from Dec 8th 2003, with “1000 building and permanent retail jobs” by 2008. I think we all know what happened to that optimistic scheme. Originally, owners Kitgrove had planned to demolish the building and keep the north west supplied with bricks “for the next decade” (the warehouse is the largest brick building in Europe). Luckily heritage groups and the city council opposed the plans.

Another scheme to regenerate “starting in 2009″ was reported in June 2008 (scroll down to Stanley Dock).

A problem both articles mention is that little light manages to make it into the centre of the building, requiring that it be cored out to create a central atrium, something akin to the entrance to World Museum Liverpool. Also the general complexity of the building means options are limited for re-use. Nevertheless, past projects were ambitious: “There will be an exclusion zone on part of the roof to provide a nesting area for peregrine falcons.”

Useful Resources:

Ownership of buildings in the Liverpool Mercantile City World Heritage Site (see p3): http://www.liverpool.gov.uk/Images/tcm21-32550.pdf
World Heritage Site Management Plan: http://www.liverpool.gov.uk/Leisure_and_culture/Tourism_and_travel/World_heritage_site/Management_plan/index.asp

Post to Twitter Tweet This Post Post to Delicious Delicious Post to Digg Digg This Post Post to Facebook Facebook Post to StumbleUpon Stumble This Post

Tags: , , ,

The Mersey and its Banks – Regeneration

September 23, 2009 in buildings, development by Martin | No comments

Liverpool Garden Festival by MC =), from Flickr

Liverpool Garden Festival by MC =), from Flickr

Two stories come together this week which conjure up memories of Liverpool in the 1980s (limited memories for me personally, as I was two when the Garden Festival was on!).

The Garden Festival site is finally beginning the last segment of its journey of regeneration. The company Langtree are the developers, who hope to begin work in November with the site being completed in a year. The £250 million redevelopment will include restoration of many of the gardens, and the building of homes. The BBC story seems to suggest that the site has been derelict for the 25 years since the Festival, which I would suggest cruelly overlooks Pleasure Island, scene of many an exciting Bank Holiday in the mid-1990s. ;)

The related story is that Lord Heseltine gave a speech yesterday to a conference celebrating 25 years of the Mersey Basin campaign, an effort to clean up the River Mersey. Lord Heseltine warned against resting on our laurels. The river is cleaner now than it has been since the Industrial Revolution, but this should be “the platform to leap forward, not the opportunity to congratulate ourselves on a job completed.”

Those who know their recent Liverpool history will be aware that Lord Heseltine was the initial force behind the 1984 Garden Festival, although the then ‘Minister for Merseyside’ was often criticised for ignoring the deeper problems of Liverpool, and settling for this rather ‘cosmetic’ and temporary fix. However, it has been pointed out that the festival raised the spirits of the region, and showed what a co-ordinated effort with the Merseyside Development Corporation could produce.

Of related interest is the fact that Otterspool Promenade on which the festival site stands was created from the dumping of household waste and debris from the Queensway tunnels from the 1930s, a process which clearly had some detrimental impact on the river, and meant that the natural features of Otterspool and Dingle Point were lost beneath the concrete which later capped the promenade.

It also goes to show that even recent history is constantly impacting on the landscape, shaping the city we live in! Feel free to share your Festival memories, or your views on the site in general!

Note: The photo above is from a collection of photos of the derelict Garden Festival site by MC =) on Flickr. This is a great collection of photos, though tinged with a slight spookiness and desolation. Plus an abandoned typewriter. It’s full of Creative Commons goodness too, so have a look!

Post to Twitter Tweet This Post Post to Delicious Delicious Post to Digg Digg This Post Post to Facebook Facebook Post to StumbleUpon Stumble This Post

Tags: , , , ,

Liverpool sites get £3.3m funding, listed building to be auctioned, and history going missing

August 26, 2009 in Music, buildings, development, restoration by Martin | No comments

Update: The BBC has reported that the Main Bridewell was sold at auction for £450,000 to a developer. Though the article mentions that ‘In 2004 developers discussed turning the building into a luxury hotel’, I will be waiting with bated breath to see what they actually do.

One of those days when several interesting stories come along at once!

Lowlands, the Grade II listed merchants villa in Hayman’s Green, West Derby has just reopened following  a £1.2m restoration project. The villa was designed and constructed by Thomas Haigh (architect also of  Marks & Spencer’s building in Church Street) and was owned and occupied by a succession of wealthy merchants and  financiers. Vast areas of West Derby were occupied by similar men in the Victorian and Edwardian periods. The Inland Revenue occupied the buildings following war damage to the India Buildings on Dale Street in Liverpool city centre. Since 1957 it has been owned by  the West Derby Community Association, and in the 1960s was a centre for the emerging Merseybeat scene, witnessing performances by the Quarrymen, Herman’s Hermits and Billy J. Kramer in the basement Pillar  Club or the main hall upstairs. This history places it on similar ground to the Cashbar, the more  famous club and coffee house just along the road at number 8.

The Garden Festival site is a place filled with memories for generations of families who all descended on it over the space of five months in 1984 (I distinctly remember the Postman Pat exhibit being centre of my attention). After lying derelict for many years (with the exception of Pleasure Island which occupied the site in the 1990s) £2.1m has been released to allow the redevelopment of the site to  commence. The North West Development Agency have put up the cash which will see a project to restore  the Japanese and Chinese gardens and pagodas, as well as the streams, lakes and woodland which cover  the site, which will become another green area for the people of Liverpool. Owners Langtree maintain  their ambitions to build 1300 homes on the site, a plan which was approved after a public enquiry last  year. A further £1.6m is being sought from the North West European Regional Development Fund. No real  mention of Pleasure Island on the news sites though…

The Main Bridewell on Cheapside, just of Dale Street is going for auction and is expected to fetch up  to £500,000. It’s proximity to the magistrates court on Dale Street means it was used to house  defendants before trial, and was originally built in 1866 to hold petty criminals. The building closed  in 1999.

for more information on why the Bridewell was so named, see the Encyclopedia.com question on the Bridewell.

Finally, in a mysterious and disturbing story, original Victorian features are going missing from the  area of Kensington in west Liverpool. Cobbles, cast-iron railings and original street signs are  disappearing from the streets around Edinburgh and Leopold Roads, but no one (residents or the Council)  seem to know who is pulling up these features. Rumour has it that the items (including stone setts  taken from ships which used them as ballast on voyages from Turkey) are being sold on the black market.  Areas removed are being replaced with tarmac. Anyone with information is being asked to contact the  council.

Post to Twitter Tweet This Post Post to Delicious Delicious Post to Digg Digg This Post Post to Facebook Facebook Post to StumbleUpon Stumble This Post

Tags: , , , ,

English Heritage launch Heritage at Risk, including Liverpool areas

June 23, 2009 in The changing city, development, preservation by Martin | 3 comments

Seel Street Furniture, by Richard Carter (from Flickr)

Seel Street Furniture, by Richard Carter (from Flickr)

English Heritage launched its Heritage at Risk Register today, with wide coverage across the media. As I’ve mentioned before, Liverpool has nearly 40 Conservation Areas within its bounds, and it is these areas which come under most scrutiny in the media. The Seel Street Ropewalks in Liverpool and Birkenhead’s Hamilton Square make the list. Below are links to some of the articles on TV and in the papers:

The main thrust of EH’s report seems to be the problems of PVC windows and doors, unsightly satellite dishes and the loss of other original features of the suburbs. Though, of course, this is only the side deemed most relevant to the public, and there are many more pressing threats to the historic environment, such as dereliction, the declining economy, and uncontrolled development.

As you can see, the Daily Mail addresses the incredibly important issue of wheelie bins while others cherish their ‘tarnished jewels’. Closer to home the Wirral Globe mentions Hamilton Square. The ‘chairman’ of the Liverpool Preservation ‘Trust’ has another rant.

What are your views on the risks to your own historic environment?

Post to Twitter Tweet This Post Post to Delicious Delicious Post to Digg Digg This Post Post to Facebook Facebook Post to StumbleUpon Stumble This Post

Tags: , ,

Liverpool’s St John’s Centre delayed

April 16, 2009 in development by Martin | No comments

A quick snippet of bad news: like many developments all over the country, the St. John’s Shopping Centre redevelopment has been delayed by three years, the Liverpool Echo is reporting. The demand for shops has fallen as the economy slows, although the owners of the site, Land Securities, are optimistic that the demand will reach “pre-recession levels” by 2012.

St John’s was built in 1969, redevelopment which followed extensive bomb damage suffered across Liverpool city centre during the Second World War.

Post to Twitter Tweet This Post Post to Delicious Delicious Post to Digg Digg This Post Post to Facebook Facebook Post to StumbleUpon Stumble This Post

Tags:

« Older entries