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Yes WW, can't argue with that. That's why we need new planners/architects to break the mould of these little boxes. The Tenements were better than what they're building now. With new houses you can hear your neighbour on the toilet. That's not right.Quote:
Originally Posted by Waterways
69% of people agree.
It is the planning laws that will change matters - the politicos can only change that.Quote:
Originally Posted by pablo42
As regards to paper thin walls, the building regulations cope with that - or not cope with it. The building regulations are law.
The House Builders Federation oppose most changes in building regs. They said that the 1990 increase in insulation levels was a "cosmetic exercise". They will fight anything that makes building a house more expensive. They do not have the intelligence to copy the Americans and Scandinavians and prefab a lot of the construction.
The point is that the land is so expensive they have to cut back to the bare bones to get a decent affordable house. Maybe there is some justification there - or just a poor excuse. So that land again!!!
If land was cheaper more money will be available to build larger, higher quality homes - and soundproof ones too. I believe the regs in Scotland are far higher regarding sound infiltration.
How do you get land to be cheaper? scupper the artificial shortage and allow more freedom to build on land.
Quite agree with your last paragraph WW. Our urban and greenbelt environments have their own secrets. When I worked in housing I saw so much "land banking" of sites, green and brownfield and a lot of this stuff is still not built on, years later, despite demand.. Where I live in Lydiate, the majority of the surrounding land, whilst still relatively untouched after the Scotch Piper Pub on the Southport Road, is actually owned by builders or similar who have bought the land and the resident or tenant farmer is allowed to rent the land back whilst the true owners await the a change in planning or green belt legislation.
They are awaiting the extension of the local plan. They buy on the edge of towns and cities knowing eventually the planning limits will expand. Planning and land allocation is rigged, according the Kevin Cahill in Who Owns Britain.Quote:
Originally Posted by Partsky
In most of Europe homes are selfbuilt. That is, they get the land, design the house and have it built by a builder (or yourself if you are up to it). That is why you do not see the vast developer estates, filled with pokey little houses feet apart, like in the UK.
http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/watercity/Housing-1.JPG
You do not see this in Germany, which has the same population density as the UK
Approximately 80% of all homes built in the UK are built by about only 20 companies. In no other country in the western world does such a monopoly exist. The sort of situation seen in banana republics. The House Builders Federation influences the building regulations so heavily in order to maintain the status quo that the UK is backwards in house building technology compared to large parts of Western Europe, Scandinavia and North America.
See:
How land affects us all
Agree with you there WW.Quote:
Originally Posted by Waterways
I have merely scanned the above because there is so much thrown in - like stuffing a baby bird in its nest - swallowed wholesale without thought, interpretation or even reference to source, other than 'my mate in a plane'.
It is fantastically costly, financially and environmentally, to build new infrastructure, particularly where it already exists; it is fantastically irresponsible to throw away building material and construction energy for want of creative thought on adaptive use; and it is fantastically immoral to suggest that all land could or should be built on.
And what an environment there would be... an endless and soulless sprawl of suburban mediocrity - a truly green, 'pleasant' and boring land.
Reckon so Petro, but I think WW is saying that the souless estates needn't be the only way. I agree with that, these housing estates are pretty dreadful.Quote:
Originally Posted by petromax
Liverpool's old civic buildings were designed by and built to show wealth with particular rich benefactors such as William Brown and Walker.
Private buildings such as Insurance Companies, some being those in Castle st, Dale st and the Liver were built as headquarters and again with no expense spared when it came to making a statement. The likes of which will never be built again. We should be proud of them.
Dunno Ged, don't think we'll ever see those big stone buildings any more, but there are some pretty good new ones scattered around. Trouble is they are few and far between.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ged
27.34% of all statistics are made up on the spot.Quote:
Originally Posted by pablo42
:rolleyes:
Naw, only 28% would believe that according to Harvard News.Quote:
Originally Posted by kevin
It helps to add a publication that don't exist.
Quote:
Originally Posted by pablo42
The trick is to add a few percentage points, rather than use a whole number like 28. Makes people believe it's been calculated in some sort of way, rather than invented or guessed at.
You're getting good at this. I'll not believe another thing you say. 97.6 people agree with me.Quote:
Originally Posted by kevin
Ha, it works.
As an academic I use statistics frequently - if I agree with how they were gathered and turned from raw data into meaningful statistics. However, in most cases I question their validity and how they've been used to try and validate an argument. Once I see the weakness in the stats, which is quite easy with a bit of practice, I see the weakness in the argument.Quote:
Originally Posted by pablo42
I'm a strong believer in the use of stats, but they've got a bad name because of the way they are incorrectly used by many.
Can't agree with that Kevin. I don't believe any statistics, they've been too discredited. They can say whatever you want them to say. People pick up pseudo statistics and they become accepted, nobody challenges the original track.Quote:
Originally Posted by kevin
You got a new avatar. A handsome man indeed.
Re-Cycling MaterialsQuote:
Originally Posted by petromax
Recycling old bricks is big business and few are throw away these days. MI have seen many modern highly insulated homes clad in old Victorian bricks. I saw a house in Surrey with bricks from old terraces from Manchester. These are mainly top of the range homes, not the developer tripe we see, which I would like to see the end of and the developers cut right down to size. Old masonry is broken up for hard core for foundations and floors.
Unfortunately we can't recycle all masonry. We need to make new materials. Masonry gives excellent thermal mass, essential in some eco homes.
The idea is cut down the continuous use of fossil fuels for transport and homes. This poisons the air we breathe and blackens buildings.
Eco Matters
Forests
Planting more forests. It has been estimated that the UK requires 450,000 homes per year in the next 20 years or so to keep up with replacement and current shortages. These homes will require a hell of a lot of wood.
The UK imports about 6 billion pounds worth of timber each year and rising. If we planted more forests to cope with the our current demand we would absorb more CO2 and wipe out most of the trade imbalance.
Wheat & Ryegrass
Rather than slow-growing forests, which would certainly have their own
benefits, there are plenty of other building materials that require less
land & time to grow.
Composite boards & panels can be made out of wheat and ryegrass stems. A similar process could be used to manufacture engineered "I" beams and the like, or the facings for structural insulated panels (SIPS). Furthermore, the insulating portion of SIPS could be made from soy, or other plant oils, rather than petrochemicals:
http://www.unitedsoybean.org/lib_fs_...id=10&type=one .
SIP Panels
http://siptec.com/images/cutaway-Siptec.jpg
A SIP panel house. The walls are mainly high value rigid insulation, not needing heating systems, cutting back on fossil fuel use and energy to make the heating system - boilers tend to last 10 years. The house can be erected in a few days and clad in any material you like, even old bricks.
http://siptec.com/images/Greek%20House_small.jpg
A finished house in SIP panels.
Earth and masonry also tend to require less land for production, especially when considering complete life cycle costs. The expense of such building
materials may be more palatable with reduced taxation of building values (Land Value Tax) - and may be economically advantageous given their longer life cycles.
UK's Land Not Used Properly
The UK's 16,943,000 ha of agricultural land could feed almost 365 million people. Alternatively, the UK's 60 million people could be fed from 1/6th of her agricultural land - with the remainder available for meat, dairy, or fibre production, just left as wilderness or used for people to live on.
But wee need land reform to do this, or introduce Land Value Tax (LVT) and this naturally sort it all out - no change in business behaviour.
It is fantastically immoral not to use the vast amounts of land available for the use of the population. Once again only 7.5% of land is settled and 5% of that is parks and gardens - what don't you understand about that figure? Do you think it is a large figure?Quote:
and it is fantastically immoral to suggest that all land could or should be built on.
Oh no!! Not again. "Urban sprawl", "concreting over the countryside", etc. Propaganda words used by the Countryside Alliance, etc. Only 7.5% of the UK is settled and 5% of that is parks and gardens, so, only 2.5% is paved.Quote:
And what an environment there would be... an endless and soulless sprawl of suburban mediocrity - a truly green, 'pleasant' and boring land.
Read this and then the three links at the top left hand corner.
How land affects YOU
You have been fed propaganda - like us all. You refuse to disbelieve what you have accepted for so long. Despite facts negating the propaganda it is still bouncing around your head.
Discredited indeed. But a lot of the work I see has the methodology of the research identified and explained - how the data was gathered and how it has been interpreted. This gives me sufficient info to make an educated guess about the validity, or not, of the stats I'm presented with.Quote:
Originally Posted by pablo42
When I just see stats and no background, which is what you mostly get in the public domain, I too refuse to take them at face value.
Ahh, I agree with those statistics.Quote:
Originally Posted by kevin
Quote:
Originally Posted by pablo42
That was the give-away that your avatar wasn't real.
No sign of the Cosmo Smallpiece-type glasses.
Don't worry, they're in the car.Quote:
Originally Posted by kevin
Something you do all too well and with about the same degree of understanding. On the whole, the conversation about avatars and glasses was more useful and more interesting.Quote:
Originally Posted by Waterways
Back to Ged's point; I would ask why do we think buildings that represent power, wealth and exclusion are more worthwhile? Come on, it's a leading question - fill your political boots!
Reckon them old buildings are just easy on the eye. The size and majesty of something like St Georges Hall is just about right.Quote:
Originally Posted by petromax
This building has a lot of those qualities (and some more others), but is it bad just because it's glass and steel and modern?Quote:
Originally Posted by pablo42
http://www.flickr.com/photos/40936407@N07/4096006418/
Agree - I appreciate the buildings for what they are rather than what they represent. The design and construction techniques used before the availability of modern cranes is beyond belief - the skills of the architects and building engineers is to be marvelled at.Quote:
Originally Posted by pablo42
The people who funded them and where their money came from is another matter.
When the pyramids were built thousands of slaves suffered and died for the glorification of the pharoahs. The history behind them is tragic but they are still marvellous edifices.
I don't think so. I like the new buildings, not all of them, but certainly some. I like Liverpool 1 and the new World Museum.Quote:
Originally Posted by petromax
The old buildings are nice to look at, these new ones are HORRIBLE :disgust:
Plus the tourist like the old buildings.
Far too much glass in the new, ugly, horrible one's that have ruined our skyline.
Roman's used slaves to build roads, so sell your car and walk on the side.
Well Kevin, I couldn't care less where the money come from. It's there and that's it. Most fortunes were built on some type of misery.Quote:
Originally Posted by kevin
But people are not as selective about old buildings. Take Josephine House - a nondescript pile if ever I saw one - a bit like a council house with fake stone cladding, but plenty here bemoan its passing, just because it's old?Quote:
Originally Posted by pablo42
The proposed replacement is definitely above average - not a star in the making - but it fronts up to the pavement line like all good city buildings should and complements the massing and scale of the two Phils on opposing corners. You could say it 'fits in'; decidedly better than what it replaces, but because it's new, albeit modest, most dislike it on principle?
In other words, you have no brains and a know-it-all to boot. Bad combination. Sad but true.Quote:
Originally Posted by petromax
Beetham West and Alex are nice. The problem with Liverpool is that few post WW2 buildings have been any good.Quote:
Originally Posted by pablo42
What makes a good building is proportion, new or old. St. Georges Hall has it.Quote:
Originally Posted by pablo42
That is a a silly thing to say.Quote:
Originally Posted by Spike
No it is not, its my opinion. Just cause I dont agree with you it dont make it silly. Did I say your replies where silly? No I did not.Quote:
Originally Posted by Waterways
So dont go snapping because you dont agree. Im sorry I did not realise we had to have your opinion.
I say it as it is ( to use your words ) Its called freedom of speech, its a forum , get over it.
Carry on your moaning, put your links up, paste 4 quotes every post. Im bored of you and you petty comments.
I have been impressed by others arguements for and against old buildings, then as per use you have to stand above all with you high and mighty ways.
Give it a rest will you, im bored silly of you:PDT_Xtremez_12:
Another thread i cant be arsed with now, seems the forum is becoming a pain due to you. ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ will be my reply to all you say from now on.
We were expressing our own opinions about old buildings and why we like them or otherwise; not regurgitating other people's half-understood theories as 'proof' of some half-baked notion or other, without even doing us the courtesy of summarising or drawing out the particular point you want to make. Why don't you go and have a lie down [sic].Quote:
Originally Posted by Waterways
Does that mean that buildings have no moral obligation? Developers are very often criticised for 'raping' the city, tearing down much-loved 'jewels', all and only for profit and gain. Do we really mean it's ok to savage the environment as long as the design is 'easy on the eye'? I think we do.Quote:
Originally Posted by kevin
Don't agree at all - the things I mentioned were in the past and there's nothing we can do about them, so hating the buildings because of how they were built seems rather churlish.Quote:
Originally Posted by petromax
Attitudes - hopefully - have moved on. Savaging the environment is never excusable.
Well I for one love new buildings. Don't like the square boxes, but there are great new buildings spread around. Sadly there are too many that are poor to say the least.
To openly a broadly state that all new buildings are HORRIBLE is silly, just silly. The Liver Blgs received the same scorn when new, as did Oriel Chambers.Quote:
Originally Posted by Spike
It is clear you comment on matters and don't know the basics of, not only that form firm opinions on - when you have been pointed to where the information is with easy explanations a number of times. You get like a stuck record refusing to believe what you have conditioned yourself to believe over the years.Quote:
Originally Posted by petromax
Unfortunately all new buildings cannot be iconic as they do not have the site for it. Look at around Castle St. Many if the buildings were Victoria speculative buildings and were not meant to make a statement. The same can be said for Lord St/Church St, the post WW2 buildings. OK they replaced bombed buildings but they were still speculative and built to a price, as were the Victorian buildings.Quote:
Originally Posted by pablo42
Beetham East, Alex Tower, the museum and Unity are all good looking modern buildings, as wil be the black shapes at man Island. Brunswick Quay Tower could have been with us but the arrogant city thought the world was lining up to build in Liverpool and rejected it. Now they say high rises can be built there.
Brunswick Quay
http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/watercity...ickQuays-3.jpg
This superb building built by a local man, would have been built by now if not rejected.