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Urban Realm Strategy
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The Urban Realm Strategy was the basis of a major three-week Exhibition at Aberdeen Art Gallery titled "City Futures - Urban Lives", which aimed to highlight how the city could change in the next decade. A review follows. An on-line version of the Exhibition, with some nice photographs, can be downloaded from: www.aberdeen.net.uk/citycentre
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City Futures - Urban Lives
ACCP is to be congratulated on mounting this exhibition, which clearly identified the problems facing our city centre in the 21st century. The approach was pragmatic and the absence of quick-fix solutions is commendable.
Pedestrianisation was, of course, one of the main topics, but the absence of a through-route for traffic as an alternative to Union St. was acknowledged. An interesting point was made about the desirability of reconnecting the city centre with the harbour, which was, after all, the original source of the city's prosperity.
Members will recall that, when the Bon-Accord Centre was proposed, one of the objections to its present location was that it blocks off the harbour from the rural hinterland by straddling George St, which used to continue the straight route from Market St northwards. The disruption of the pattern of the medieval town by modern developments was remarked on.
Also discussed were the problems created by the differing levels - the original ground level sloping down from St Nicholas Kirk to the Green and the harbour, and the higher levels created by the super-imposition of Union St, Marischal St, Market St and Bridge St. What about installing escalators from Union St down to the Green, and down the side of the Theatre?
The desirability of having the student population resident in the city centre rather than on campuses on the periphery was discussed. The development of Broad St as a Civic Square was raised, but nothing was said about the removal of St Nicholas House!
April 3rd 2002
Strategy to Transform City Centre
Aberdeen City Centre Partnership is drawing up an "Urban Realm Strategy" which aims to enhance Aberdeen city centre as a place to live and work by improving its environment and by favouring pedestrians over vehicular traffic.
Six strategic projects have been identified:
1. Reasserting the "axial elegance" of Union Street by upgrading its environmental quality in favour of the pedestrian; ie, pedestrianising all or part of Union St.
2. Consolidating civic uses in and around Broad St. to create "Aberdeen's front door on the world". Broad St. could come back to life as a civic square. The revamped Marischal College will occupy one side, whilst Provost Skene's House could re-emerge from the shadow of St Nicholas House - the more so if St Nicholas House were demolished!
3. Guild St. and the Green to be re-joined to the heart of the city by new pedestrian links. The massive Guild St. retail & leisure development, due to start shortly, will be connected to the harbour and Union St.
4. Maximising the potential of Union Terrace Gardens - no longer to be a deserted hollow, difficult to access and snubbed by passing crowds - by means of a facelift, by providing access from Union St and Belmont St, promoting better uses and by extending the Gardens to the north, presumably so as to encompass the William Wallace statue. Intention is to create something more like Edinburgh's Princes St. Gardens.
5. The Denburn/Woolmanhill area - presently blighted by inner ring roads and concrete carbuncles - recreated as a safe and redesigned area with small shops, offices, restaurants, cafes, an hotel and flats, with landscaped open space.
6. Encouraging the revitalisation of the Castlegate, presently Aberdeen's most lamentable waste of space; creating a "cultural quarter" with new shops, cafes & galleries in refurbished buildings.
Aberdeen City Centre Partnership (ACCP) comprises Aberdeen City Council, Scottish Enterprise Grampian, Communities Scotland, Aberdeen City Centre Association and Grampian Chamber of Commerce.
Empty buildings have been turned into flats, offices and shops; areas of waste ground have been transformed into places to sit and relax.
Major projects have included the revamping of the Belmont St/Little Belmont St/Back Wynd area, which has received an award from the Civic Trust; the Academy Shopping Centre, the Belmont Arts Cinema, the Maritime Museum, the pedestrianisation of the Green and St Nicholas St, the rebuilding of the south side of the Castlegate with 100 new flats, the redevelopments of the former lodging house in East North St as flats and the Galleria Shopping Centre on Langstane Place with 40 flats above.
ACCP Co-ordinator John Carnie says that there have been many improvements to the city centre over the last decade, with the Partnership alone completing around 330 projects. But even more is required now that there is increasing competition between cities and regions to attract new business and visitors.
Aberdeen aspires to be a quality, competitive location, with a diversified, modern economy - a city which is safe, clean, welcoming and cosmopolitan. The ACCP team had studied north European, English and other Scottish cities before drawing up their own revamp plans for Aberdeen.
22nd April 2002
St. Nicholas Kirkyard
The Kirkyard, designed by John Smith in 1829, is being given a major facelift, intended to encourage more people to enjoy the historic surroundings, to meet and eat their lunch there. Stonework is being cleaned, repointed and painted with an anti-graffiti coating. The wrought-ironwork in the granite screen facing Union St. has been repainted in black and gold. New paths are being laid down to open up the Kirkyard, which is no longer used for burials. More seating and floodlighting are being installed, and the gates will stay open later in the summer months. Information boards will explain the Kirkyard's history.
All this is to be welcomed, but we suspect the Kirkyard will succeed as a safe and welcoming "green public space" only if the new by-law against drinking in public places, such as already exists in some 400 Scottish towns and villages including Glasgow and Dundee, is vigorously enforced.
The new ACC by-law covers the whole city rather than just a few designated areas, and was enacted on Sept. 30th 2002. The only exemptions will be for Hogmanay, licensed cafe-bars with outside tables and special events like the Tall Ships race.
There remains a law & order problem in the Kirkyard, not least of alcohol &/or drug abuse and of muggings. There is a conspicuous lack of police presence the entire length of Union St - who is actually supposed to be enforcing the new by-law, or the law in general?
27th April 2003
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