Britain As It Might Have Been

[wiggleyleeds]

Central Leeds in the 12th century, before construction and development commenced..

[heywindup]

This is what London would have looked like if the Celts died off and the Romans never moved the capital of Britannia from Colchester to Londinium.

[ill tonkso]

Portsmouth (excluding the old city) if the Victorians hadn't drained it, built levee's and filled in nearly all of the lakes. Most of the Island Portsmouth is built on is Artificial.

Some of the old Marshland is left, for example here at Farlington. You can see to the left how the island was built out of the marshland.

Thats what the whole city would have been like.

[Dr Pepper]

The Earth Centre, Doncaster was intended to "establish a world centre for sustainable development promoting the best environmental and sustainable practice" which opened in 1999 with funding from the Millennium Commission in Conisbrough, Doncaster, South Yorkshire, England. It closed its doors after going bankrupt in 2004. Only phases 1 and 2 were ever built.


The Project
The 10,000m, £26million Ark is the centrepiece of the 160ha, £125million Earth Centre being built on a disused colliery site in South Yorkshire. This will be the world's largest showcase for sustainable development, with a predicted 2.5million visitors a year from year 2000. It is envisaged as the largest public education complex to be built in the United Kingdom since the great Victorian museums of South Kensington, London. Phase I of the Earth Centre is fully funded and nearing completion on site - The Ark is a Phase 4 development.

The Purpose
The Ark will house multimedia exhibits and exhibitions for explaining environmental issues and discussing a vision of a sustainable future. The displays will be housed on three mezzanine-type floors, structurally independent of the roof canopy. The double-arch roof expresses the Earth Centre's aims in built form and marks the new millennium. Its shape is inspired by nature, with the longitudinal appearance of a hovering butterfly and the appearance on plan of an insect's eyes.

The Structure
The 120m long structure of the Ark will be built into the side of the colliery spoil tip, all that now remains of the site's two abandoned deep coal mines. The tip's thermal mass will help warm the building in winter and cool it in summer. All materials of construction for Earth Centre buildings have to pass a 'sustainability audit'. Energy costs must not be excessive. Production must benefit the local economy. Products must not impose any irretrievable damage on the environment.

The SHS
The roof arches each span 60m to the butterfly's central spine. Timber, steel and concrete were considered as the structural material. Had timber been chosen then structural economy would have dictated the use of tied arches or cable-stayed trusses. A steel versus concrete comparison was carried out. Steel was chosen because it is more easily recycled. British Steel was able to point out that the energy cost of smelting and rolling the steel is outweighed by subsequent benefits. This choice of steel for the roof arches complements the natural choice of steel for the main spine girder and perimeter ring beam, which alone weigh some 700 tonnes.


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[heywindup]

I'm not sure if this video has already been posted, but here is Abercrombie's vision for London after the war.

[Dr Pepper]

Originally posted by up the tigers

Here's some monstorous road plans that were planned for Hull in the late 60s/70s. We still got a dual carriageway severing the city centre from the waterfront but it could have been much worse.

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It shows the road leading to what would have been part of the orbital ring road. It would have ploughed straight along the historic high street.

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And the buildings that would have been demolished.

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[Dr Pepper]

Sunlight House was used as the headquarters of Joseph Sunlight's property business, the initial building was originally intended to be 30-stories. This proposed 40-story extension in 1948 was never built.

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[reading general]

we have a ring road in reading similar to hulls, which was only part built. demolished half of the terraced area of coley to accomodate it, all of the st marys area, and severing london street from the rest of the town centre. ended up going nowhere until the early ninties when an alternate route completed a ring around central reading.
the m31 motorway it was supposed to be connected to never arrived either.

[reading general]

Originally Posted by Dr Pepper

Sunlight House was used as the headquarters of Joseph Sunlight's property business, the initial building was originally intended to be 30-stories. This proposed 40-story extension in 1948 was never built.

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wish we had a lot more of this in the country rather than later brutalist affairs

[Dr Pepper]

'The Bruce Report is the name commonly given to two urban redevelopment reports of the Glasgow Corporation (the former local authority area for the city).

Central to the report's recommendations were a set of radical proposals which amounted to wholesale demolition of a large section of the city centre. These would have involved knocking down many historic and architecturally important Victorian and Georgian buildings. The report advocated rebuilding most of the city centre to a single design with the aim of creating a coherently planned city. Among the buildings earmarked for demolition were many which are now regarded as Glasgow's most significant architectural assets. Bruce's proposals called for the demolition of (amongst others) Glasgow Central Station, The Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum, Glasgow School of Art, designed by the renowned architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh and the Glasgow City Chambers which is considered the civic heart of the city. Robert Bruce's justification for these radical proposals was the creation of a new "healthy and beautiful city" based on formal 1950s architecture. Ultimately less draconian measures were sought for the regeneration of the city centre.'

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As well as housing reform and recommending changes to Glasgow's road network, Bruce also suggested radical changes to Glasgow's railways. At the time of the Bruce Report, the city had four major railway stations. Central and St Enoch both served primarily southbound destinations. Queen Street and Buchanan Street mainly served northbound destinations.

In order to rationalise the city's mainline services, Bruce suggested that all four stations be demolished and replaced with two new stations. A new Glasgow North station was proposed roughly on the site of Buchanan Street station (occupying a larger area) to replace Buchanan Street and Queen Street stations. A Glasgow South station was proposed on the approximate site of Glasgow Central station to replace Central and St Enoch stations.

Before:

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After:

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[Dr Pepper]

Originally posted by oscar9


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Found this letter regarding the tower from the Manchester bid document for the 2000 Olympics.

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[Dr Pepper]

Originally posted by crusty_bint.

Glasgow survived German bombing raids in WWII relatively unscathed but the postwar Comprehensive Redevelopment Plans saw large swathes of the city swept away, along with a third of the population (of over a million) carted off to new towns. We're still recovering from it.

Anyway, as a little digression here's some of what was built during this era and a little of what (thankfully) wasn't.

The planned areas of Comprehensive Redevelopment showing the plans for the Inner Ring Road, the east and south flanks of which were never built.



The Vision:
West Flank from Kingston bridge.



West Flank from Charing Cross cutting.



Townhead Interchange (built) and Eastern Flank (unbuilt) which would have severed Glasgow Cathedral from the the rest of the city.



South Flank (unbuilt) and early plans for the redevelopment of the Laurieston and Gorbals areas which are undergoing large-scale redevelopment again.

[Dr Pepper]

'Brick Man was an Antony Gormley sculpture proposed for the city of Leeds, West Yorkshire, England.

A male human figure standing over 100 feet (30 m) high, it would have stood on a triangle of land bounded by railway lines in the Holbeck area of the city, greeting travellers arriving at Leeds railway station. It would have cost £600,000 and been the largest sculpture in the UK at the time.

The sculpture was one of twenty designs produced in response to a competition to find an artwork for the site, but the proposal was ultimately rejected by Leeds City Council in 1988. Conservative councillor Richard Hughes-Rowlands said at the time: "If Mr Gormley is talking about it [Brick Man] going somewhere else, my eyes won't exactly be weeping tears."

Gormley has blamed "lack of nerve" for the rejection of his idea, adding: "I think of it still as my best attempt to allude to the collective body." The idea of an iconic landmark sculpture of the human form later saw the light of day in Gormley's Angel of the North.

A maquette for the sculpture can be seen in Leeds City Art Gallery.'

Photo from Gaters on Flicker.

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[Dr Pepper]

Originally posted by Mr. B


I was surprised at the scale of the Motorways the Planners of the 60's had for Greater Glasgow when I found this layer for Google Earth, I mean just look at the scale.

North link Motorway 3 leaved Clover Junction (Unbuilt)


Eastern Section of the Inner Ring Road (Unbuilt)


Johnstone Motorway (Unbuilt)


The Planned Motorway(Blue) and Expressway(Red) Network


Motorway's that passed through Glasgow Green (Unbuilt)

[ill tonkso]

Rejected Wooden Rollercoaster that would utilise the 200ft deep valley running through Alton Towers.



(yes those grey lines ARE the drops)

[Dr Pepper]

The Gambling Act 2005 revised many regulations relating to gambling in England. Amongst the most controversial provisions was the establishment of a number of 'destination casinos' in the style of Las Vegas, commonly referred to in the media as 'Super Casinos'

Initial drafts of the act proposed eight regional casinos but concerns expressed in the national media and by a range of addiction related social and religious groups meant that the final revision of the act permitted only one casino of the largest size, referred to as a 'Regional Casino', with a further eight 'large' and eight 'small' casinos of a smaller sizes and with reduced Jackpot limits.

The proposed 'Super' Casinos.


Cardiff
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Wembley
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Sheffield
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Glasgow Clyde Designs
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Glasgow Ibrox
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Blackpool
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Manchester
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The first Regional Casino was initially proposed to be in the City of Manchester, but this has since been scrapped by the UK government soon after Gordon Brown became Prime Minister.

[Dr Pepper]

Originally posted by Erebus555




'These were just early plans but the development did go ahead, just in a different form. It became the dreaded Lee Bank estate which has all been demolished and the massive area if now under construction as Park Central.'

[Dr Pepper]

Originally posted by Amscwl.


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The rest of the document can be found here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/hamblet...7603523100997/

Cardiff City Council's Concept Plan.

This plan illustrates developments approved in the late 1960s on the edge of the city centre, and plans for the comprehensive redevelopment over the subsequent decades. High rise towers were planned above pedestrianised bridges linking the multi-storey carparks to the extensive covered shopping amlls. The nascent for of both St David's One and St. David's Two shopping centers are evident in the plan. Only the St. Mary Street corridor is protected from comprehensive redevelopment.

The 1970s property recession saved Cardiff from repeating the large scale redevelopment mistakes of many other British cities and forced it to adopt a much more piecemeal and gradual approach to redevelopment, but still broadly following the outline of Centreplan.

In a bid to re-start commercial redevelopment in 1975 the city advertised five separate development sites that it had acquired, each with a prescribed package of commercial and public facilities, and awaited offers from private developers. The most important of these was land to the south of Queen Street and north of Hill Street. Major retailers signed up with the Heron Corporation to develop St David's Centre, creating an effective but awkward link between Queen Street and The Hayes. St. David's Hall was developed within the scheme, providing the city with a major cultural venue.

The disposal of the four remaining sites was slower and more compromised as investors and developers resisted the city's aspirations and pursued their own largely functional requirements. The Oxford Arcade was extended with a Tesco Store (later Primark / Dillions)and a multi-storey car park and a new central library was developed behind. The Holiday Inn (with a 2.5million GBP grant from the Welsh Office) built a fourteen-storey hotel supporting conference business at St. Davids Hall but rather wasted a key island site at the foot of The Hayes, whilst opposite Toys'R'Us developed their single-storey outlet alongside a barren plaza, a modest ice rink and a large multi-storey car park. A third multi-storey car park was completed on Bridge Street. It took a 3 million GBP grant to persuade Brent Walker to develop the World Trade Centre, a major arena/exhibition hall subsequently known as the Cardiff Indoor Arena (CIA) and a new Hotel (formerly Jurys, now a Park Inn) opposite.

[Dr Pepper]

I have added a letter from the developer of the Vector tower to its post above.

[Octoman]

Some of the stuff you have dug up on this thread is incredible Dr Pepper. Great effort.

I cant believe those plans for the Glasgow motorway network. Even the bits that were built have left a scar accross the city. If it had all gone ahead the city would have literally become a fractured collection of loosely linked 'urban patches'. Awful. I suspect they had an LA style freeway system in mind.