Bradford | Westfield Bradford Shopping Centre, offices and apartments | Appr

[Leeds No.1]

I agree about the logo- it's horrible.

[Mezzo]

Have just found this old pic of the city centre from the mid 1940s, just before the last redevelopment took place.
It's about the best aerial shot I've seen, and clearly shows the entire area that's currently a hole.
Forster Square is bottom right, and everything else is pretty much intact apart from a couple of blocks on Broadway next to the Ritz cinema.
It's also clear just how close the 2 old stations were... it's a tragedy they've never been connected.



I've got another aerial pic of the university area from the same time if anyone's interested.

[Dan B]

Originally Posted by Val Verde

I totally agree with you Dan. A street by street approach, perhaps a modern day interpretation (not pastiche) restoration of what stood on Broadway and Forster Square prior to the previous rebuilding in the 1960s would be a good idea. Out of interest how long did the previous (hideous) Broadway scheme take to develop (presumably an awful lot less time) and why on earth couldn't the buildings have been retained until construction was definately to go (so there is not this major city centre void and it would allow for some retail usage in the meantime letting some custom into Bradford and the Broadway Void also ironically acts effectively as a Berlin Wall splitting the main part of the city centre from Little Germany (which LG really could do with promotion as it is such a potential major asset for Bradford) and surely a restored Forster Square would have been a good thing.

Wouldn't such a development genuinely revitalise Bradford as opposed to creating yet another bland, corporate and generic shopping mall which could be located anywhere in the world and constructed any time since the 1950s.


If I ran Bradford Council I would certainly have not gone for such a development as the current Westfield proposals (in addition to the insanely long gestation period for this scheme) especially as Westfield's existing purpose built shopping centres in Derby and Shepherds Bush, London look rather poor to me and in the case of Derby had resulted in many high profile retailers just moving to the new centre and leaving many empty units across the city centre. Also why does Westfield have to have the same generic branding on each centre thus resulting in even less individulality.



Westfield Derby (formerly The Eagle Centre)



Well I am sure that for many people in Bradford, Leeds City Centre has long been a de-facto city centre for shopping, leisure etc considering that for so long Bradford has lacked facilities people need.

Agreed, agreed, agreed!

The construction site certainly does act as a void and mostly blocks the continuity through the city to Little Germany, one of the most valued areas of the city, yet underused. I think it has livened up a bit as an area with all the new residential developments of the warehouses and a number of offices and places of work, but a street continuity with some public space like a square or park (indeed as the new Forster Square) in between would help it out even more.

That photograph of the Derby Centre is truly horrific, that horrible cladded grey box sticking up on top of it all with that terrible logo. Alas, it seems something of a similar nature is planned for the Bradford one:


By Cantfindaname

Some great hulk of metal on top. Great.


And if that's right about stores relocating to the shopping centre in Derby and closing up elsewhere, I can see much the same thing happening in Bradford as much of us fear. With a more tempered gradual shopping street development, this could have been alleviated by offering a fairly minimal amount of shops at a time, primarily focused at retailers that would be new to the city, first off with the two department stores that were originally planned, Debenhams & BHS (which probably would be there now, if built prior to their re-evaluation of their business distribution), then more decent brands could have bought up stores keeping competition & demand high. I don't see why shopping centres are always seen as such a must have these days. I'm starting to consider them a thing of the past, self-inclusive, detrimental to their surrounding environment and often poorly designed. I guess it's easy to say all this in hindsight, but was there no forethought?

Originally Posted by Mezzo

I think a few of us are in agreement about this. If there had been a street by street approach, maybe we wouldn't be in this mess now.
Right from the start the whole scheme has been way too ambitious.

Your point about Little Germany being cut off from the rest of the city centre is a good one too. It's completely isolated at the moment, and beginning to feel a bit like a ghost town as several businesses have recently failed and there's alot of empty office space.
(If you're passing, please buy something from Keith at his little kiosk in Pennine House - I know he's really feeling it!)

Also, even if Broadway does eventually happen, although it will reconnect Little Germany it will effectively obscure it.
The plans as they stand completely block the view of the frontage along Well Street. It's quite an imposing view at night when the buildings are floodlit. They really should have left some kind of open public space as a buffer zone between the two.


Good point. And if they insist on having their own branding on everything, they should at least be made to come up with a less offensive and dated logo.


It's hideous!

Will have to remember to buy some things from him when I next pass, help the man out.

Sad to hear about Little Germany starting to fall down through this recession. It would be totally obscured, and I agree, the view of the illuminated buildings that front the area at night is truly beautiful, a park, maybe somewhat linear, out in front of it would be the ticket. There's your buffer, and then more shopping streets at a good distance, and fulfilling the actual requirements of the city without stupid unnecessary delays.

Once again, logo = yuck.

Originally Posted by Mezzo

Have just found this old pic of the city centre from the mid 1940s, just before the last redevelopment took place.
It's about the best aerial shot I've seen, and clearly shows the entire area that's currently a hole.
Forster Square is bottom right, and everything else is pretty much intact apart from a couple of blocks on Broadway next to the Ritz cinema.
It's also clear just how close the 2 old stations were... it's a tragedy they've never been connected.



I've got another aerial pic of the university area from the same time if anyone's interested.

Nice image. Just shows how much better the city was connected up. Those buildings on Broadway seem about the same quality as Little Germany too. The buildings that surrounded the station also looked like they gave the place a proper frontage, and it's amazing just how close the stations were. I don't know why they didn't link them when they bulldozed Broadway, it was the best possible time. Now I feel the two stations are too far apart. It's amazing the amount of buildings along Nelson Street and surrounding City Hall too, the area must have decimated, comparing it to what it's like now. They ruined the centre.

Would you be able to post that photo of the University Area? I've always wondered what it used to look like before the University was built.

[Leeds No.1]

The Derby Westfield is absolutely horrific- how did that get planning permission!?

Has Bradford ever planned to arcade a street? Like it did in Leeds, a development like that could spark a renaissance in Bradford without risking further destruction of it's historic city centre like Westfield could.

[Dan B]

Originally Posted by Leeds No.1

The Derby Westfield is absolutely horrific- how did that get planning permission!?

Has Bradford ever planned to arcade a street? Like it did in Leeds, a development like that could spark a renaissance in Bradford without risking further destruction of it's historic city centre like Westfield could.

Another view:


By Cantfindaname

My God! That is a streetscape? Admittedly it wont be the same from all perspectives, but why would you even include that? What is it for? Is it a car park but without any ventilation? Even if it is, they could have better cladding and make a better feature out of it?

Probably an even more depressing view with Woolworths now gone.


As for arcading streets, this was the only example I've seen in an Neighbourhood Development Framework, probably long forgotten about now:


By Cantfindaname

Looks nice, but completely the wrong area for it.

As a point, the Broadway area did formally include Bradford's Arcades, in the The Swan Arcade Building, where Arndale House is now, you can see it on the aerial photograph posted above between the wool exchange (clearly triangular shaped building) and the Ritz (sort of triangular, but with curved edges and the main theatre sticking out). I'm sure the building had a network of arcades within it. Something like that wouldn't go a miss. Modern Shopping centres haven't got anything on the old victorian arcades.

[Leeds No.1]

I see they have labelled it as 'Potential World Mile'. I'm not sure that would exactly rival La Rambla or the Champs-Elysees; not even The Headrow!

The first image reminds me of the Arndale. It's the colour. That is going to date so quickly.

[Mezzo]

Bloody Hell... that second view of Westfield Derby has left me speechless. It's unspeakably bad!
If Bradford's version is supposed to end up looking like that, let's hope they never get round to building it.

Originally Posted by Dan B

As a point, the Broadway area did formally include Bradford's Arcades, in the The Swan Arcade Building, where Arndale House is now, you can see it on the aerial photograph posted above between the wool exchange (clearly triangular shaped building) and the Ritz (sort of triangular, but with curved edges and the main theatre sticking out). I'm sure the building had a network of arcades within it. Something like that wouldn't go a miss. Modern Shopping centres haven't got anything on the old victorian arcades.

Swan Arcade was beautiful. There are some very good pics of it in the T&A's Bye Bye Broadway book. I can't find any of the exterior online,
but here are a couple of interior shots:

Originally Posted by Dan B

Would you be able to post that photo of the University Area? I've always wondered what it used to look like before the University was built.

Here you go...
Sorry, having looked at it properly it's not really the university area (although it's heading up that way) but it does show where the college is now.
It would be quite difficult to find a point of reference without the good old Odeon building there at the bottom!

[Val Verde]

Originally Posted by Mezzo

Have just found this old pic of the city centre from the mid 1940s, just before the last redevelopment took place.
It's about the best aerial shot I've seen, and clearly shows the entire area that's currently a hole.
Forster Square is bottom right, and everything else is pretty much intact apart from a couple of blocks on Broadway next to the Ritz cinema.
It's also clear just how close the 2 old stations were... it's a tragedy they've never been connected.



I've got another aerial pic of the university area from the same time if anyone's interested.

Nice aerial image (if only Google Maps existed back in the 1940s). Just shows what vandalism has taken place in the centre of Bradford in the post war years onwards (which insanely is still taking place today).

Still it is a massive shame that the Midland Railway never linked the two Bradford stations together in the early 20th century as it is certainly detrimental to the long term development of Bradford (considering Leeds had a viaduct constructed in the late 19th Century linking what is now City station with the now closed Marsh Lane station (near Quarry Hill) to enable a much wider array of rail destinations and avoid the need for reversals.

As for Little Germany it is certainly an asset which if in another city it would surely have acted as a high end office quarter and it should certainly be linked into the rest of the city centre as it does look fantastic and deserves to have more recognition and links with the main part of the city centre. Out of interest did Little Germany ever get renamed during either of the World Wars for obvious reasons?

Finally Westfield Derby certainly looks rather an awful looking development and presuming what is happening in Bradford is the same, what was the point in getting rid of what was on Broadway (as ugly as it was) considering such poor architecture would presumably have to be replaced in 20 - 30 years from now (if it ever gets built that is).

[Dan B]

Here's some views of the Swan Arcade externally:


By Cantfindaname

Here the building on the left opposite the Ritz.


By Cantfindaname

Here the building on the right up the street a bit.

Not a building to find external pictures of generally, though there was quite a good one at an exhibition of C.H. Wood at Bradford Gallery One at Centenary Square.


Et Voila:


By Cantfindaname

Think that's about where they'd synch. No overlap available though.

Edit: Just made a slight alteration, thought they needed to be a little further apart to truly synch up.

[Mezzo]

Thanks for putting that together Dan.

It's quite a sobering thought that if that pic was taken in the mid 1940s, and Stanley Wardley was appointed City Engineer in 1946 - he probably looked at the same image when coming up with his 'central area redevelopment plan'.

How anyone could look at that streetplan, and then do what he did absolutely beggars belief.

[tomd89]

A few images I've found on the net of those early plans

[Mezzo]

Haven't seen those before!
It looks like we got away lightly in the end... Mr Wardley and his associates were clearly off their heads.

Buildings missing from the first pic (so I assume they were meant for the chop) include the Alhambra, St George's Hall, Midland Hotel,T&A and Eastbrook Hall.
Little Germany is an ominous shade of white too, so God knows what they had planned there.
I'd love to see a key to go with it.

The second pic I guess illustrates what they were trying to do... sweeping away the disorganised Victorian city centre and putting everything in nice neat compartments, all centred around the car.
Ironically, one thing that they did get right is a completed inner ring-road, we're still waiting for that!

I suppose we should be thankful we've got as much left as we do.

[*-City Of Bradford-*]

So were all complaing about Westfield tacky designs. Well if you look at the bradford plans they don't actually look too bad



For more pics look at the first page

[listerpark]

From the plans above it certainly looks like the 1960's and 70's "regeneration" (or whatever it was called back then) could have resulted in even more destruction than it did.
Back to the present day I wonder how this news will be reported by our local newspaper, if at all? I for one do not wish to have to see that crater of shame for another two years.

[*-City Of Bradford-*]

Originally Posted by listerpark

From the plans above it certainly looks like the 1960's and 70's "regeneration" (or whatever it was called back then) could have resulted in even more destruction than it did.
Back to the present day I wonder how this news will be reported by our local newspaper, if at all? I for one do not wish to have to see that crater of shame for another two years.

I think Westfield should change the design then. They should incorparate a Railway Station and for the shops which have not been filled, replace them with:

A tourist Attraction
Some Apartments
More Free CarParking
Sports Facillities e.g Swimming Pool/New Ice Ring
Offices (PUT NEW VICTORIA HERE AND LEAVE THE ODEON ALONE)
Concert Hall
Bars
Clubs
Restraunts
XScape Centre

[dunlin]

or some unicorns, and a walrus polishing shop.
Tourist attraction - we already have the National Media Museum (700,000+ visitors a year), [and which Bradford never talks about]: what else do you suggest?
A hotel - apart from the Midland, Great Victoria, Etap, Holiday Inn Express, Hilton, Premier Inn and Cedar Court there are already 3 applications going through planning (end of Thornton Road, Yorkshire Water Depot, Yorkshire Bank building), plus the one in Westfield (they put in for a change of use last year: the entire Hall Ings side will be a hotel) and the Odeon.
A railway station - we again have 2: what we could do with is joining them up
Aaaargh and
With land values now so low couldn't we afford to turn the Westfield site into a lovely welcoming park at the heart of the city?

[*-City Of Bradford-*]

Maybe a new Go-Kart Racing Centre?

Indoor ThemePark?
New Collage/University

[*-City Of Bradford-*]

I really think, Bradford Council should get the land back.

[Dan B]

Originally Posted by listerpark

From the plans above it certainly looks like the 1960's and 70's "regeneration" (or whatever it was called back then) could have resulted in even more destruction than it did.
Back to the present day I wonder how this news will be reported by our local newspaper, if at all? I for one do not wish to have to see that crater of shame for another two years.

Think this should be posted up here for the world, or the forum, to see:

Westfield's $700m mall on hold
Article from: The Advertiser

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CHARLES MIRANDA, LONDON

January 25, 2009 11:30pm

SHOPPING mall giant Westfield has delayed construction of a development worth more than $700 million in England's north as Britain announced it was officially in recession.

The project in Bradford involves the construction of 54,600sq m of shopping, offices and apartments in the heart of the city that has been struggling with high unemployment levels.

Rumours the credit crunch was affecting the time frame of construction, which had begun with more than $160 million of site preparation work, were circulating among subcontractors a few weeks ago, but were downplayed by Westfield.

It appeared yesterday, however, too few retailers were confident in the present climate to take out leases in the planned mall, a mandatory Westfield ``development goal'' to ensure the project went ahead on schedule. It is understood Westfield could find only about half of the expected 100 tenants required.

Start dates to two other British projects also are understood to have been put back and several Westfield redundancies are expected to be announced.

It is thought the Bradford urban redevelopment project will go ahead when the economy bounces back.

Economic analysts and the government do not expect that rebound to be before 2010 - when the mall was supposed to open.

A spokeswoman for Westfield said the project had not been ``shelved'' and the group was committed to delivering, although she would not specify a timeframe.

``Despite the economic climate we have an active team working on the project,'' the spokeswoman said.

``Our focus remains on securing the required level of pre-lets before commencing full construction and we continue to work very hard to do this.''

Westfield employs about 5000 staff worldwide and has interest in more than 100 shopping centres across Australia, Britain, the U.S. and New Zealand. In Britain, it has eight shopping centres including a recently-opened $4 billion project in London's west.

It also is developing Westfield Stratford City, next to the site of the 2012 London Olympic Games.

http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/s...70-913,00.html


Is this actually official though? Have Westfield announced it being put on hold? Or is this just speculation on the Newspaper's part, based on some pretty conclusive evidence and circumstances?

Originally Posted by *-City Of Bradford-*

I think Westfield should change the design then. They should incorparate a Railway Station and for the shops which have not been filled, replace them with:

A tourist Attraction
Some Apartments
More Free CarParking
Sports Facillities e.g Swimming Pool/New Ice Ring
Offices (PUT NEW VICTORIA HERE AND LEAVE THE ODEON ALONE)
Concert Hall
Bars
Clubs
Restraunts
XScape Centre

I think at least some of that could be incorporated, well, in a perfect world where there isn't land rights and ownership issues.

I certainly agree with it though in theory. Concert Hall wouldn't be necessary as if the Odeon was left along, the BORG plan could do that for us, but again land rights issues with Yorkshire Backwards would be near impossible to wrangle with, despite their former perjurous claims to the opposite. I see no problem with a sized down scheme of shops, offices, bars/restaurants/clubs, with enough space for a central station and a reinstated Forster Square, but I think we all have to accept Westfield would never let this happen, and the council has no where near the money to pay for all this additional infrastructure, or legal battles against Westfield, it would be a huge undertaking. There would also be all the existing enabling works which have already been put in place, restricting what is possible with the site without removing it all. The underground carpark hole, would still be useful though to any scheme.

Originally Posted by dunlin

With land values now so low couldn't we afford to turn the Westfield site into a lovely welcoming park at the heart of the city?

A park would be nice, you could use the existing dug underground car park, cover it, and create entrances from it directly on to the square via steps and lifts. Would make a nice entrance into the city. However considering half the shops were signed up to Westfield, perhaps half the site could make for a retail scheme, or a few, potentially combined with a new central station (actually I've just thought of a problem with having a central station, and that would be loosing the advantage of the combined Bus/Rail Interchange, which is good from a transport infrastructure perspective, if only they'd used the old Exchange Station as a combined interchange, using half the tracks, and the rest for bus ranks).

Again I'm dreaming. We wont see anything done with this site until the economy perks up, even then though, Westfield still only have half the scheme signed up to.

This is never going to happen.

[Val Verde]

Originally Posted by City of Bradford

I think Westfield should change the design then. They should incorparate a Railway Station and for the shops which have not been filled, replace them with:

A tourist Attraction
Some Apartments
More Free CarParking
Sports Facillities e.g Swimming Pool/New Ice Ring
Offices (PUT NEW VICTORIA HERE AND LEAVE THE ODEON ALONE)
Concert Hall
Bars
Clubs
Restraunts
XScape Centre

Well surely there is next to no chance of seeing an XScape open in Bradford with one only relatively close by in Castleford and surely the Odeon would make a fantastic concert hall as opposed to creating an all new one on the Broadway site, I do agree with a rail link between Forster Square and Interchange stations. As for free car parking wouldn't that cause more congestion and discourage people from using public transport to get to Bradford city centre. As for other ideas what about using the Broadway site to host an open air concert (if it is safe to do so) or perhaps an art installation either in the Broadway site or along the wall surrounding the Broadway site?

Originally Posted by Dan B

Think this should be posted up here for the world, or the forum, to see:

http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/s...70-913,00.html

Is this actually official though? Have Westfield announced it being put on hold? Or is this just speculation on the Newspaper's part, based on some pretty conclusive evidence and circumstances?

Well with Eastgate in Leeds on hold I can't see any chance of the Broadway scheme taking place any time soon.

Again I'm dreaming. We wont see anything done with this site until the economy perks up, even then though, Westfield still only have half the scheme signed up to.

This is never going to happen.

What would happen to the status of Broadway if Westfield go under (as could be possible considering the current recession)? Presumably the administrators would take control but could Bradford Council take the scheme over in default perhaps (perhaps a term of contract of what could happen if the developer goes bust)? Anyway here for the benefit of this thread here are some pictures of the Broadway site at various times including the demolition of the previous buildings.

I wonder could some of the previous buildings on Broadway have actually looked ok if they were refurbished as opposed to demolished (although there should still have been demolition considering I remember there was too much of the grey 1960s concreteness I guess leaving some could perhaps be reasonable to enable an evolution in architecture which would be best for any town or city centre). You can clearly see though in the some of the pictures the clear Berlin Wall effect that the Broadway void has had though between the main part of the city centre and Little Germany.



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Is anything planned for the part of Broadway which remains shown above (where there is a Yorkshire Bank, HMV, Game and disused Burger King amongst other retailers and empty units) considering whenever I walk past there is seems to be slowly dying off as a street considering it is stuck on a limb to the rest of the city centre and is blocked off at one end by the dormant Broadway site.

Going further considering Will Alsop made that plan for Bradford several years back (which of course was widely ridiculed and was clearly more of a publicity sturt than a serious plan), is there any chance of the BBC, Channel 4 etc giving him a chance to come back to the city (similar to what happened with Maxwell Hutchinson's return to Leeds ) to see the lack of progress made in regenerating Bradford City Centre.



I know he's rather an idiot considering I remember that Supercities programe from a few years back did seem a bit insane in proposing gigantic psychadelic skyscrapers with things such as farms within them with proposals to develop a city between Liverpool and Hull but it could make quite an interesting programme (provided of course he is not a polar opposite to Maxwell Hutchinson and ends up being too positive and in cahoots with Bradford City Regeneration, Yorkshire Forward, Bradford Council etc (which could be possible considering he did a lot of masterplans for numerous local authorities such as Barnsley and Middlesbrough in addition to Bradford which would presumably have given him quite a lot to develop a masterplan)). I can't see him doing too much at the moment architecturally wise considering the state of the economy so surely I guess it could be interesting to see him back in Bradford perhaps presenting something about the state of the lack of regeneration that has happened in the city.

Alternatively has anyone notable such as David Hockney or anyone else notable from Bradford (Linda Barker doesn't count) ever said anything on the status of his or her home city centre?