[DarJoLe]

The South Bank 'cluster' isn't tight enough for me. I'd be happy for towers to be centred around Blackfriars Road to create a mini cluster of office and residential towers, but the current proposals pull the cluster apart and are too stretched out. Where 'is' this South Bank cluster anyway? Waterloo? Southwark? Bankside? Vauxhall? London Bridge?

Clusters are meant to be a collection of skyscrapers within a stone's throw from each other, not 'along a river' or dotted across the landscape.

This tower, if given permission, will set a dangerous precedent that might mean the Thames heamed in by more towers.

 

[jimbo]

As far as I am aware, the official project title is still 1 Blackfriars Road.

 

[Fragmentor]

I think it's quite important that you can still see The Shard there, it'll add quite a lot to this cluster from this angle, and will be a great little photo oppurtunity when it's all done

 

[dubaiflo]

i think this is quite cool..

i have been to london, typical tourist, seeing everything in quite a rush and i must say i don't think the location is that bad when it comes to view or anything like that.


and apart from that, be proud to get another Jumeirah Hotel, those guys are the best in the world..

 

[london lad]

Barcelona, Batterea Park City and stretches of Lower Manahattan, Brussels ...

All of these cities have tall towes but to my knowledge none of them have put a tower in an equally historically sensitive area during their recent regeneration. For instance, do you believe that NYC would approve for the Beetham to be put down in the midst of the warehouses of Soho or the Meatpacking district???

But now, in London we put it down just right next to the Tate Modern, the Oxo Tower, the Globe, Southwhark Cathedral and Borough Market. Just to say that it is surrounded by a mess of a few oversized 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s and 00s buildings is not good enough an excuse.

You can hardly compare Manhattens meat packing district with Blackfriars road. Maybe Shoreditch & Hoxton which has done a good job at regenerating themselves.London has many pockets & areas of regeneration & its not as simple as saying right we want a nice new square here etc. Southwark for example is a big area, even if you just concentrate on the river aspect of it with many conflicting land owners & stake holders with different problems with a mix of old industrial sites & architecture with modern apartments & council housing and major railway stations in need of renovating.

In this you can include the OXO tower & tate modern. 6 years ago many saw the tate as a dirty old industrial building with little architectural merit & wanted it pulled down. To use the OXO tower & coin St as an example of regeneration , the OXO tower was a neglected building that was due to be demolished for a large Rogers designed scheme. The Coin St organisation managed to stop the development & have built for the local population which it represents . They have over the years regenerated the area & built social & private housing. They now plan a tower to finance the new Rambert dance centre & a new leisure centre as well as making the area between the site & waterloo bridge more pedestrian friendly. This sort of piecemeal & long term approach is happening along the Southbank from Westminster to Tower Bridge.

The southbank centre is also improving the pedestrian enviroment between waterloo & hungerford bridge, adding a new entrance to the Royal festival hall so it acknowledges South London & not just the river. The area around the Tate is also seeing the same effect. Pre-2000 this area had a defunct power station, some dubious offices from the 60-80's & council estates. By 2012, hopefully they should be an extended Tate Modern with a public square around the back, hoepfully pedestrainised streets encompassing it with the AF HQ nearby & New housing etc. I agree Bankside 123 is too overbearing & im not a fan of the architecture of Bankside 123 & the massing (somebody seriously f**ked up in Southwark when they allowed them to be so big) but thats the realities of regeneration. You can have utopia idea but it still needs to be paid for etc & seeing as Bankside was a 60's office block previously owned by Land Sec what can you do. You cant dictate what to build on a certain site to its owners. You cant just rezone whole sites & areas of a city if its already in use. You can masterplan areas of large brownfield sites such as the Greenwich peninsula & Canary wharf but not an complex are as the southbank riverfront.

This area will not be overrun with high rises- The areas where they are suitable is where they are proposed, mainly along the busy blackfriars road & along Waterloo station. You will not get 20 or so high rises along the river as most of the sites are along the river are devloped with housing or cultural buildings already. The stretch next to Beetham can only realisticaly see Sea containers house being redeveloped & this would highly unlikey be a highrise as it is right on the riverfront. Apart from the already tall kings reach the rest is the Oxo tower complex , a park & housing with the only other potential redeveopment site being the IBM centre. On the other side of Blackfriars bridge are the two nasty office blocks of Sampson house & the Express building. You could potentialy have a high rise here but I would see this as an acceptable site as it would be opposite Beetham and form a gateway with it into Southwark from the north. The area between the rest & the Tate is filled with housing both social & private so no real tall buildings here either except of course the 24 storey Rogers designed residential tower to the SW of the Tate.

 

[mulattokid]

I met a guy on Jury service whos parents were renting a Housing Association flat in the OXO building. It was big and airy (the flat I mean) and was clearly and proudly stating its industrial heritage (loft like). The balcony hangs over the Thames footpath and overlooks St Pauls and the western edge of the city and to the left as far as Somerset House.

Now who would not want to live in that flat in that location? Social housing does not need to be downtrodden and smelling of wee.

 

[JGG]

London lad, I agree a lot of good happened to the Southbank until around 2000: County Hall redevelopment, London Eye, Hungerford Bridge, Tate Modern, Milennium Bridge, Oxo Tower, City Hall, the Globe, new walkways and streets.

Now what have we been getting since 2000? Bankside 123, MoreLondon, the Plaza crap, and fortunately one positive, the Royal Festival hall redevelopment. The new walkways and streets haven been poorly maintained and are already falling into disreapair.

And above all it is clear that a coherent masterplan is lacking. I understand there are a lot of complexities, but that should not stop you from having a cluster policy, from having uniform and suitable street furniture, from having a pedestrianization strategy, etc.

The biggest problem I have with this building has actually nothing to do with this project itself. It is the demonstration of the weakness of planners in London to impose proper policies. Why should we even talk about having clusters when every developer will successfully argue that "his tower" should be an exception? And those guys are very savvy, yes they give away freebees to locals (like a petty dance school) and the planners cannot stand up to that because they do not have these freebees to hand out.

It is clear most of the boroughs are too weak to stand up to the big developers and planning for any major project should be transferred to the Mayor's Office. The fundamental question on my mind is to what extent Ken Livingstone will back Rogers and provide them with the freedoms he needs.

 

[wjfox]

Also maybe it would be a good idea to make a new poll based on the revised design.

Good idea.

http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=400279