Merseyside Police has announced that they intend to build a new HQ on land between Scotland road and St Anne's street, I mentioned this area briefly a while back in
Scotland Road & Leeds Street.
Then
Some people have romantic notions of life around Scottie road but while I can't claim to have lived there most of the stories make me glad I didn't a place with a great sense of community and sectarian violence was a phrase I once read. Together with some truly appalling living conditions, Ben Johnson Street allegedly notorious as the worst street in Liverpool was in the area.
St Joesph's Catastrophe 1870
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| No 6 Court Comus Street |
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| Victoria Square Juvenal street |
Now
The area outlined in red is the semi-detached tumour, in white is St Anne's Street police station, while green is the area of still standing buildings. The blue area seems to be the proposed site.
Future
New police HQ: Who is affected and what do they think of the £45m plans?
Profligate Splurge
The major problem I have with this is the amount of land it takes. The low price of land in Liverpool means that organisations can save on building costs by building low rise. High rise buildings are a sign that the land values are high. The problem is that this, in Liverpool, has produced semi detached and other low-density housing in the city centre, which in the case of some, especially the Eldonian village, has removed land which used to house industry. In other cases, it has just meant lower density housing, which should the cities fortune pick up, will mean more and more pressure on the green belt.
Rather than indulge this profligate splurge of land use and compromise the future, the council should be ensuring that the city centre is all high density both housing and offices. In this case, vast swaths cannot be wasted on car parks, which should be in an
undercroft and basements beneath the building.The plots left unused to can be held over for later development.
What is at risk here is not just the older buildings that still stand but the potential represented in the size of this site, really it should be taller and confined to 1 perhaps 2 of the blocks, perhaps the ones that back onto the tunnel approach, leaving the old buildings intact and leaving 3 blocks free for development.
In giving this land away cheap to Merseyside Police the council will be squandering it assets, it should price the land in such a way to force Merseyside Police to build higher, then sell the rest of the land on for other developments when the market price is higher, not to do so would squander its resource.
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| Undercroft parking on Pall Mall, Liverpool |
The area outlined in red is the semi-detached tumour, in white is St Anne's Street police station, while green is the area of still standing buildings. The blue area seems to be the proposed site.
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