Heap Mill, Beckwith Street, 1980

Bridgewater Street, 1980

Bridgewater Street, June 2014
I picked up a leaflet this week asking me to sign a petition to save Heap Mill. The ex-rice mill is in a prominent position facing Albert Dock and next to the Formule 1 hotel on Liver Street. Planning permission is being sought to demolish the dilapidated warehouse complex to build a block of apartments. Those in favour of the new development (according to online sources) seem to be fairly evenly split with those wishing to save the mill and see it converted to other uses. The conservation lobby argue that warehouses were a key element in Liverpool’s history and only a small number of the larger complexes remain. So on which side do I fall?
My heart is with those wishing to hold on to buildings which have such a key relationship with the city’s trading past but, in this case, I can see no future for what is a rather grim block which has long since served its purpose. I can see no developer coming forward to convert the building, which has bulk but little aesthetic charm – the cost would be astronomical.
What bemuses me is that two key warehouses on Bridgewater Street have just been demolished without, to my knowledge, any fuss being stirred up. Admittedly, again, the warehouses were little more than facades having been burnt out some years ago – but their prominence at the gateway to the Baltic Triagle was impressive.
I started by business life in a run-down warehouse om Manesty’s Lane. Apparently, the building was Tate and Lyle’s first warehouse but when I moved in (in 1973) it was almost a shell. The floor plan was literally a rectangle with a heavily beamed ceiling with a circular stone case in the corner as access. The roof leaked because of the parapet roof construction, it had no running water and in winter (or most of the year) was bitterly cold because of the metal loading doors on each level. My recollection of Liverpool at that time was of street after street lined with similar obsolete buildings, all decaying. I can think of no other city in England that had such dereliction within a few yards of its main streets.
So, sadly (for I am a great believer in keeping the best examples of our heritage), I will have to go with the modernisers on the Heap Mill question. There are more important battles to be fought.



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