| Topic: | Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Empire House Development | |
| Posted by: | Kathleen Healy | |
| Date/Time: | 24/11/14 01:03:00 |
| Not suggesting the lend lease development will be as bad as Woolwich Central, but this is an interesting and illuminating article on how developments can go very wrong. Refreshing that the councillor and former chair of planning is so honest about his blunder. http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/sep/03/woolwich-central-tesco-carbuncle-cup Developers are allowed to make changes after permission is granted that can greatly alter the look of a development The public with no particular expertise has to try to assess from drawings what a building will look like once built. Materials have a big impact on how a building looks, but that can be hard to ascertain from drawings. I don't think people are anti development but the last 40 years have seen some horrendous development that has blighted areas; aesthetically and economically. That is, I think, why people are wary an mistrustful of new developments. The nicest and most successful town centres are the ones that, like Chiswick, didn't get a new shopping mall in the 70's or 80's. having escaped then, I think it is reasonable that people want to keep the pleasant and successful town centre they have. It seems unfair to blame the public and call us NIMBYs. Inept architects and developers concerned with cost and profit and not the long term impact of development on an area should bear a lot of the responsibility for the public's reticence about development. |