[Not Tall Enough]

They make a lot of money for the land owners and operators, I'm sure they pay a lot to BCC in terms of rates.
I don't mind them if they are designed not to look like multi story car parks (I've seen good examples shared on an older threat relating to this) it should also encourage the council will clamp down on even uglier surface car parks that definitely are a lazy use of valuable real estate.
Thankfully this one is on a back street only used for through traffic which is probably what let them get away with such a horrible design.
Hopefully we will see some proper development on the large surface car park on Great Victoria Street that has been an eyesore for a long time now.

 

[wakka12]

Unbelievable, and they couldn't even put a shop on the ground floor to soften the impact a bit. I really thought as a planet we had moved beyond building new multistory car parks never mind in the middle of a European city, I thought most places had enough of these awful things to contend with and suffer from the 70's and 80's without polluting the city with more of them

 

[phillips01]

Thankfully this one is on a back street only used for through traffic which is probably what let them get away with such a horrible design.
Hopefully we will see some proper development on the large surface car park on Great Victoria Street that has been an eyesore for a long time now.

Problem is when the Transport Hub is finished construction it won't be a back street anymore, and will be one of the main pedestrian routes to the city centre. It bad planning.

 

[Chris MC]

Horrible.The city has become very much neglected and as a frequent visitor I have noticed an alarming lack of economic development and growth. Boarded up shops, dilapidated properties, homelessness, graffiti, drug and alcohol misuse litter almost every area of the city centre. It definitely looks as though the middle classes have abandoned the city center and left it to rot. The future of the city centre looks very bleak.

 

[belfastuniguy]

It's horrible but I think the rationale behind the project is a desire to reduce the number of surface carparks and consolidate parking in fewer places and away from the city centre core. I recall hearing something along those lines a while back.

 

[Not Tall Enough]

Problem is when the Transport Hub is finished construction it won't be a back street anymore, and will be one of the main pedestrian routes to the city centre. It bad planning.

I see your point, I will need to double check, I think the plan is to pedestrianise Glengall Street and hopefully tidy it up a lot. Once the current station is gone it should be wider and have better street frontages. The Grosvenor road depresses me just driving along it.

 

[odlum833]

tbh I think that's disgraceful and the council should be held to account. No city is doing that now. Cities that have them are knocking them down. There is no rationale for that unless you want Belfast to become a throwback to the late 70's.

Something needs to be done. That can't be right. That's wasted space economically and socially and it looks dreadful in this day and age.

Ugh, someone else say something...

 

[Chris MC]

tbh I think that's disgraceful and the council should be held to account. No city is doing that now. Cities that have them are knocking them down. There is no rationale for that unless you want Belfast to become a throwback to the late 70's.

Something needs to be done. That can't be right. That's wasted space economically and socially and it looks dreadful in this day and age.

Ugh, someone else say something...

Ok so the developers don't bear any blame for that monstrosity? It is easy for online armchair experts to criticise, but as the previous poster pointed out, this car park is replacing one that will be demolished to make room for a new transport hub.

 

[odlum833]

In 20 years time it will probably be knocked but what a waste. I'm not not sure the rationale of demolishing a car park to build that stands up tbh. Invest in public transport maybe.

 

[Andy H]

They make a lot of money for the land owners and operators, I'm sure they pay a lot to BCC in terms of rates.
I don't mind them if they are designed not to look like multi story car parks (I've seen good examples shared on an older threat relating to this) it should also encourage the council will clamp down on even uglier surface car parks that definitely are a lazy use of valuable real estate.
Thankfully this one is on a back street only used for through traffic which is probably what let them get away with such a horrible design.
Hopefully we will see some proper development on the large surface car park on Great Victoria Street that has been an eyesore for a long time now.

Grosvenor Road is a back street?! Just shows the disastrous effect 40 years+ of economic stagnation and even worse planning "decisions" have had on our city!

They could maybe put a "green wall" in front or something?

 

[belfastuniguy]

I see your point, I will need to double check, I think the plan is to pedestrianise Glengall Street and hopefully tidy it up a lot. Once the current station is gone it should be wider and have better street frontages. The Grosvenor road depresses me just driving along it.

That’s correct. Glengall Street will be the main pedestrian route connecting Gt Vic to the new square and station. It’ll have new developments with active street frontage.

Grosvenor Road will remain a busy traffic route connecting city centre with the west of the city. New development is planned for that road though to the side and behind the transport hub. If those developments and the proposed new build beside the police station then that section could make a decent gateway to the city centre.

 

[belfastuniguy]

Invest in public transport maybe.

It’s a private development. Across the street there’s a £200m new transport hub under construction.

 

[Saulalvarez]

Grosvenor Road MSCP - Future Belfast

Still baffled this was passed and built. It is laughably bad. Reminds me of the 80's carparks you see in hospitals/airports in America. From reading the link, it was refused planning permission but won an appeal in 2009. Planning application was submitted in 2003 and rejected in 2007.

Are we really looking at a non-updated design from the early 2000's here....

NCP Carpark Manchester, what is possible...

 

[belfastuniguy]

It’s hideous. I’m baffled how it cost £20m. That’s the value of the loan they got to build it.

 

[Chris MC]

Grosvenor Road is a back street?!

In fairness, I think you need to look at it in the context in which it stands; next to several surface car parks, next to an urban highway, next to warehouses, next to a military-style police station. This situation will not change until the demand for land in the city centre increases.

 

[phillips01]

True I was forgetting about Glengall street - it will need much TLC itself.

Hopefully all the land that is unlocked by removing great europa bus / victoria street station distracts from the car park.

 

[odlum833]

They could have at least tried spruce it up but for some reason allowed something that actually looks worse than many contemporary MS car parks you'd see in hospitals or at airports, for example.

It's a strange decision. Hopefully as the economy improves again this will be seen as a good opportunity and it will be knocked. Particularly with planned transport hub.

 

[Not Tall Enough]

Is that NCP carpark run by the same operator? It really is pathetic what planners let them away with in Belfast. It will bring in plenty of money and if the developer was able to borrow £20 m against it they have clearly kept most of it for dividends or other projects.
i liked the idea of a green wall garden someone mentioned earlier, I'm not sure how much maintenance they require but would definitely be an improvement.

 

[Not Tall Enough]

I actually feel like emailing the architect to congratulate them for getting such a horrendous design through planning and ask why there is no photo's of it on their website or twitter account. Even by 2003 standards it's pretty awful.

 

[mcstick1109]

Presumably the only reason we got that carbuncle and not something more like the NCP in Manchester (shown above) is because the owner was only motivated by money i.e. this option is the cheapest to construct and so maximises profit?