Is the headline to a letter in today's Times:
Sir, The decision by the Secretary of State for Communities to give the go-ahead to a 472ft residential tower on the South Bank, against the advice of English Heritage, an independent planning inspector and expert bodies such as the Georgian Group, ranks as an especially crass example of government philistinism.
The impact on Somerset House, one of London’s finest examples of Neoclassical architecture and a remarkably accomplished essay in English Palladianism, will be grim. Up to now, the view south from the entrance off the Strand has remained as the architect of Somerset House, Sir William Chambers, would have seen it. But now the symmetry of his river terrace will be ruined by an interloping excrescence, as the new tower pokes up over the roofline....
Robert Bargery, Director, the Georgian Group
Yup. They've even mocked up a photo to show the calamitous impact. The blue bit is the 472ft tower:
Are these NIMBYs for real? If they're worried about symmetry, shouldn't they be demanding that they grant planning for another 472ft tower a couple of hundred yards to the west-southwest (i.e. to the right on the photo) to even things up again?
Saturday, 23 August 2008
"Bleak outlook for Somerset House"
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
When will work start? 2017? Or will they wait until the market bottoms?
They'll wait until the market starts picking up again, i.e. around 2017.
How very sanguine of you,Mark.
There are two montages on page seven of this PDF of Coin Street's proposals which show something like what the Georgian NIMBYs are complaining about in the earlier proposals but not in the ones approved the other day.
Post a Comment