Originally Posted by
Waterways
Brunswick Quay Tower was one, however the city politicos turned it down. A Liverpool man and company too - Hargreaves the Matalan man. A billion pounds worth of investment snubbed. Then the knock on effect a high quality development brings - so probaly twice that figure.
We have that in the Three Garces - already there.
Or what silly planners and politicos want. There have been countless very high and high quality proposals for Liverpool over the decades, yet apart from the second Beetham and the Metro Cathedral, no new buildings stand out in the city. In 1951 There was a proposal to build a 50 floor plus building in the old Custom House site. Turned down flat and the design emerged in New York as the Pan Am building - a NY landmark. The low rise tat that was built on the site in the late 1960s was appalling and eventually was demolished after a short time. Vison? The city is devoid of it. Yet only 100 years ago the city oozed confidence and originality. Nothing stopped the city from innovating.
What do expect when every proposal has floors lopped off and years of planning delays. The developer then starts to see that they cannot maximise the potential of the site and cuts back on quality. Brunswick Quay had lengthy delays and came to nothing. Developers see this, and see Liverpool as no-go area and take their money somewhere else. A city still poor and turned down world-class designs and investment, is a seen as a do-nothing stuck-in-the-past place, unable to make any firm decisions on its own future.
The fashion of the time, like any other time - although you have a point about how they are at ground level. Then the developers cuts back at ground level because his original design had 25% of the floors lopped off by planners/heritage, etc.
Unless you have a brilliant original designer, buildings that stand out cost. Unity is no run of the mill building, being a little different.
Some truth in that, however point to the planners/heritage people. Many developers do want to have high quality building that sell and command high rents. They are constantly turned down, so they take the easy way out.
Liverpool in the late 1800s/early 1900s built some high class, advanced, high quality buildings that are still around. They didn't have the constraints of the developers of today.