Auchterness

My New Year Message

2012-01-01T17:42:00.013Z

Well it's all over again for another year. You know, I received so much abuse for my Christmas Tree last year that I didn't bother putting one up this time. But there were some highlights: the office party was great this year. I got a yellow hat in my cracker plus a sewing kit for on the job repairs to my spaver if necessary (check the meaning here if you are not from these airts).

Turning to more serious matters though, I can assure you that 2012 will be a stunning year for planning in Scotland. Firstly, local authority planners will be stunned to find themselves mostly out of work (key words here are 'early retirement', 'package', 'job shop', 're-purposing' and 'deal to go') as the reality of their hopelessness dawns on their employers and others. Secondly, planners working for developers or consultancies will be stunned to find that it suddenly becomes really easy to get planning permission. An enormous Tesco on the edge of town? GRANTED! A palatial mansion in the middle of nowhere? GRANTED! A nice wee collection of volume builder breeding hutches on a public park? APPROVED! And this will be the day-to-day of planning work. In a few years time it will disappear altogether from local government.

At the sharp end of masterplanning, design and implementation (where Auchterness is naturally positioned as a thought leader) there is much to look forward to. Throughout 2011 although I haven't written as much as in previous years, the forces of bright light and intelligence have been extremely active. The triumvirate of Dr Donald Trump, Sir Ian Wood and Sir Euan Jamieson have bossed Scotland in the development stakes with Dr Wee Stewartie Milne close behind. It's a breathtaking and utterly fantastic situation in which golf courses, public parks and riversides will become the most desirable places to live, shop and drive to. Amazing!

Most of all, in Aberdeen later this month, Sir Ian will be carried shoulder high on a sedan chair from Torry to Union Terrace Gardens where he will announce the winner of his great competition to flatten the Victorian Slum Garden that is the current focus for wine drinking drug addicts and perverts. I hope he will be wearing his academic robes and ermine for this event.

Just as an aside, Sir Ian is a man of great insight, judgement and taste as we all know but his personal grooming is also important to him. Every day, the hairs springing from his nostrils are cut back by a team of highly trained Aberdonian fishermen and farmers. Of course I'm not suggesting that he's a Big Jessie - but a man in his position has to look good and for Sir Ian, this comes naturally. I also believe that his women dress strikingly - their skirts showing off their hairy knees - in a manner much appreciated by farmers in the area. This is why they are panting on their tractors at the very thought of selling their eggs to the catering caravans situated around the Wood Group HQ in Torry!

But I digress. Finally on the subject of architecture, I was going to write up a nice wee blog post about the Stirling Prize again but the moment past and I've let everyone down - I know. In case you need reminding, it was won by Zaza Hadid again for some school in England. I watched the programme and was impressed by Zaza himself who accepted the prize (pictured above). Truly he is the Hercule Poirot of architecture with his smooth European mannerisms and accent. I don't understand why the building won but he is the sort of person I would like to go on a hiking trip with and enjoy some naked fighting in the snow!

Anyway enough for now. I will be back to report on the Union Terrace Gardens result and on many other exciting developments in planning in Scotland. Cheery Bye now and all the best for 2012!

Christmas Sabotage!

2011-12-29T19:30:00.006Z

You know, I've been absolutely frantic over the past few weeks. I discovered that most of my lovely cherished photos were missing from my wee blog for 2009 - one of my most fertile periods. They were replaced by a big triangle the same as the one above - dozens of black boxes and white triangles! My lovely wee blog was critically injured and sabotaged. I was in tears.

I checked with Google to find out what had happened and soon the truth dawned on me. Now I didn't know this but when you have a Blogger blog like this one, all your images are stored on a Picasa site - I didn't even know I had one! Well I do now and I've found out that a complete folder of images was deleted from my Picasa site, irretrievably, by someone close to me. The person who did this was my own son - the boy! I've never hit the boy but I came very close to it this time.

I haven't talked much about my personal life recently as there hasn't been much to say. I haven't seen my beautiful wife in over a year although I still take the boy out every second weekend. He is handed over to me by an intermediary. I don't enjoy it much - he has become a monster. A selfish inconsiderate young thug, always wanting the latest gadgets, always wanting more - obviously going to be a Young Conservative if you ask me. It's clear that he isn't being brought up properly by my wife and her young lover - yes they are still together - but what can I do?

Anyway it has taken me two weeks to try to put it all back together again. Some of the images were rescued from Google but the quality isn't the same. I was heartbroken when I discovered that the great shot I took of my new male friends hiking in Austria was missing - I was fair blubbering into my keyboard when I discovered that. Inconsolable! I've got a poor quality version back but it isn't the same.

So there are a couple of lessons for the Festive Season. Firstly, always back up your data and your website. Secondly if you have a son who is the victim of a marraige broken by lust and the pleasures of the flesh, don't let him near your computer and don't tell him your password. I hope you all had a Merry Christmas.

Perth enters the 21st Century

2011-12-15T19:36:00.007Z

You know, I was keeping my powder dry on the subject of the Perth City Hall demolition until the dust had cleared. But this morning I received my personal copy of Project Scotland, - the wonderful construction news magazine that features many photographs of 'Village People' type men in hard hats and other entrancing visions of a better Scotland revolutionised by the development industry - and just had to set out my stance on this as an expert planner.

So let's get started! The story is that Councillors in Perth have approved plans to splash out some £4.4m on a demolition operation to clear the city’s B listed City Halls in order to create room for a new square! Fantastic! According to Urban Realm (the best source of gossip and tittle-tattle about architecture in Scotland) the dreadful and depressing building has lain empty for years since the Council constructed a new concert venue. So you can see that it is ripe for demolition. Indeed it is low hanging fruit if I might continue the organic analogy.

It's hard to see what the fuss is all about isn't it? A derelict building being cleared away to make a new square or perhaps to make way for a new development such as a small Tesco and car park - so what? Well let me tell you that this would be an excellent initiative and would free the taxpayer of a huge liability. In fact consultants hired by the Council (probably the excellent Halcrow) speak of an additional spend per person per visit of £23 as a result of an increase in visitor numbers and lengths of stay in the vicinity of the building. This is because people don't like old buildings and prefer to be in a place where there is new development and beautiful people rather than the fat women in sandals and brightly coloured cardigans who hang about old buildings.

No doubt the conservation movement will be gearing up to protect this old ruin but they will be wasting their time as Perth decides to enter the 21st Century by having a truly contemporary centre. In fact this is just the first small step for a Council whose huge ambition and foresight could see most of the city centre's old building stock cleared away in a dramatic move to place it in the same league as Aberdeen.

Good luck to Perth and Kinross Council - they are demonstrating the very best in modern planning and I have have given this project a gold star and 9 out of 10 in my little notebook. We should all give them every support!

The true heart of Aberdeen

2011-12-05T19:25:00.012Z

You know, I meant to tell you about this a few weeks ago but somehow it slipped my mind. To be honest, I've been on the edge of my seat waiting for the results of the Union Terrace Gardens competition - in the full expectation that nothing short of the complete levelling of the existing gardens will triumph but sadly there is no news yet.

Meantime, I thought you would be fascinated and excited to read my report on the true beating heart of enterprise in Aberdeen. No it isn't Union Street - it vanished as a great part of town many years back. No it isn't Union Square either though it is certainly worth a big gold star in my little notebook. It's the headquarters of the Wood Group nestling in East Tullos Industrial Estate just across the railway from the slums of Torry. You can see the clever strategy at work here - baiting the plebs with a great view of rich people at work. David Cameron would be proud! This is the working home of Aberdeen's Giant of Enterprise, Economic Colossus and Patron of the Arts, Sir Ian Wood. This is where it all happens and it's the beating heart of the city.

I drove down there in the autumn and boy was I excited! The first thing that struck me was the amazingly high standard of design - the elegant entrance sign, reminiscent of the giant black stone slab in 2001 A Space Odyssey that the monkeys gathered round. Same idea here but in silver and red. I expect that all employees will wear a uniform - and they will be proud to do so.

As an expert planner I was totally numbed by the extent of the surface car park - a truly great design - and so large that I could barely make out the headquarters building beyond. Fantastic! As I've said many times before, the size of a car park is in direct proportion to the virility of the designers and the success of the business attached to it. So the Wood Group are no slouches! As I peered through the security fencing I could just make out the stunning cream coloured walls and the rustic pitched roof of the offices. Amazing, or 'awesome' as the boy would say. I was perspiring and trembling with excitement.

You know, once Sir Ian gets his hands on Union Terrace Gardens we are in for a real design treat. He is so obviously a man of great taste and judgement and entirely the best person to redesign the centre of Aberdeen, making a silk purse out of the sow's ear that is Union Terrace Gardens. So if the same talents in architecture, landscape design and town planning that laid out the Wood Group HQ are let loose on Union Terrace Gardens, Aberdeen will become one of the design centres of the World. Without question.

But meantime, let's try to be patient and see if there is any news this week - keep your eyes peeled for an announcement in the Press and Journal! I know it's a terrible newspaper but it's cheap and it loves Dr Donald and Sir Ian so buy it!

Scottish Borders Council Farce

2011-11-22T10:15:00.008Z

You know, I was enraged the other day to read about the decision of Scottish Borders Council to refuse permission for a striking new development by Springfield Homes on design grounds. If you look at this great image above, you will see just how fabulous new homes really are in Scotland. So what's the problem and what do folk who work for one of Scotland's most forgettable Councils know about design? A bunch of paper pushing bureaucrats, grey men in suits and fat women! If they don't watch out, they will find themselves being reorganised in the near future!

Now to be honest, I haven't seen the plans of this marvellous new development but, as an expert planner, I can tell you that it will be as good as any other volume builder housing development - in other words, completely excellent in every way especially with regard to design.

And talking about excellent housebuilding, I happened to drive past Wee Stewartie Milne's fabulous company headquarters near Aberdeen the other day. It's just off Enterprise Drive - what an appropriate street name! I felt the electricity in the air - that buzz of Enterprise and Deal Making! The warm ether of human values and the big metaphorical cuddle of care for people simply looking for a place to stay - a place to call their own home. I felt myself stimulated beyond measure - the fuel gauge on my dashboard said FULL! I was sweating profusely and my shirt and trousers were stained with dampness - my throat was dry as I shouted, "Come and get me! I'm your man! Give me a job you wonderful Tory Housebuilders! Humiliate me and lock me in your basement!" Well by the time I got home I was exhausted. That's what passion does to a man and that's what's lacking in Scottish Borders Council. It's also what makes Wee Stewartie Milne and Scotland's other great housebuilders so fecund.

I was intrigued today by this non-story in the centrist London Rag The Guardian about house builders lobbying the Government. You can be sure that Scotland's great house builders were part of this lobbying exercise which seems to have been successful of course. Say what you like about the Tories - we all hate them up here but they always help out their rich friends while identifying the Enemies of Enterprise - like Scottish Borders Council - which is most definitely not open for business.

The White Worm of Union Terrace, Aberdeen

2011-11-15T20:36:00.011Z

You know, I found myself standing fully to attention the other day when I saw the first pictures and read the amazing news about the Big White Worm proposed for Union Terrace Gardens in Aberdeen. Now it isn't clear if this scheme has been selected by the imperious Sir Ian Wood - the business and cultural primate of the entire city - or if this is the design option that has had the public literally screaming for more at the exhibition of proposals. Or both!

But wait! Wasn't the whole idea to fill in the derelict gardens, sweeping away opportunities for sordid bestiality and gay pick-up points in bushes before you could say 'multi-storey car park'? I certainly thought so but this design doesn't seem to do that. I'm not impressed by the Christmas Card graphics either - a sugary image aimed at the ignorati of the city. It's true that you have to discipline yourself (as I do every evening) to look beyond the graphics and although the Big White Worm may have got saliva running in Aberdeen, it is a false dawn - believe me. What is required here is a sunken shopping centre beneath a large paved park - a bit like Red Square built over the gorgeous Braehead shopping centre. That's what Sir Ian has in mind I'm sure.

But we will have to wait for a few days yet while the great minds figure out how best to ignore an entirely ignorant public and proceed with the scheme they wanted all along. Personally I thought that the original Halliday Fraser Munro scheme was a work of true genius but better minds than mine decided that a competition was necessary - so be it! I was delighted to read that Wee Fat Alex Salmond has promised £70 million to keep this brilliant initiative on target - and in so doing, has dashed the chances of a bunch of no hope projects in Central Scotland where there is simply no drive, vision or economy for that matter - apart from the fabulous work by those clever folk at Glasgow Harbour, Strathclyde Passenger Transport and Forth Ports who will always tick my boxes.

As I've said many times before, we should all entrust ourselves to people who have money, power and vision. In so doing, we will bring success and riches on ourselves and make Aberdeen not only the powerhouse of Scotland but the economic power station of Europe - if not the world. Let's get on with this great project!

The shame of the Kelpies

2011-11-10T20:37:00.008Z

You know, a fan of mine alerted me today through a social media network of which I am a privileged member to a new competition organised by that great institution, the Royal Incorporation of Architects in Scotland (RIAS). They have been commissioned by Falkirk Council to select a multi-disciplinary team to design the internal space within a giant sculpture of a horse’s head. The structure will be set within one of two horses head sculptures, ‘The Kelpies’, designed by dreadful cliché artist and millionaire Andy Scott who you would be forgiven for thinking is Scotland's only public artist or sculptor. Yes every public art installation will look the same - just like in the good old Soviet Union. He is also a judge in the competition so everything is going well for him.

The competition also seeks the design of a complementary visitor hub on the same site - I think they mean a public toilet. When I read this I immediately thought that Keppies would be the obvious choice for this work and I hope they will be entering the competition along with Halliday Fraser Munro and ADF, all of whom are highly talented thought-leaders in the field of public toilet provision especially in the green belt.

Although this sounds fine, I have to question the basis of this work and the need to have these awful sculptures lying about in a field in the first place. Is it only me that sees them as a waste of public money at a time when we all live in fear of our jobs? Scotland is a great wee country you know but it is sadly prone to these outbreaks of stupidity.

What we need is for someone to come out and say that this is rubbish instead of everyone nodding and agreeing to punt Andy Scott yet another fat fee. Perhaps Ruth Davidson, our gorgeous new leader of the Scottish Tories has a few words to say? She looks like a woman who has her scones in the oven. I will never vote Tory - and neither will anyone else I know - but condemnation from her would be like warm milk in my ears. This nonsense has to stop now!

Fantastic happenings at Glasgow Harbour

2011-11-05T18:00:00.027Z

You know, with more and more fantastic commercial developments smashing their way through through the misguided hopes and aspirations of inbred conservation minded communities across Scotland - all with the support of a new wave of market orientated neoliberal local councils - it is hard for me to single out specific instances of excellence. There are just so many fantastic developments around that I am genuinely spoiled for choice.

But there are some exceptional things happening and it didn't take me long to identify those apron-wearing masters of the compass and square, ADF and Glasgow Harbour Ltd, as the authors of an astonishingly bold proposal for Beith Street in Glasgow. They've lodged a grand planning application which brilliantly challenges established concepts of what good design should look like. Those new blocks marching down to the river excite me enormously! When I first saw it I jumped out of my seat and hit my head on my reading lamp. The scheme is described here (http://www.ads.org.uk/designreview/reports/beith-street) by the bankrupt and secretive organisation known as A+DS who called it in for Design Review but couldn't find enough cliches to praise it.

I must say that Glasgow Harbour has always been one of my all-time favourite developments and the brilliant genius in charge, Sir Euan Jamieson, is clearly a man of culture, intense vision, intellectual might and overwhelming good taste. You know, it would be great if he could bring some of his style and panache to the rest of Scotland. Can you imagine what would happen if he joined forces with Dr Donald Trump and Sir Ian Woods? The possibilities are endless and amazing! The opportunity is there to finish off Scotland's faceless culture of local authority planning once and for all, substituting it with a dynamic market led blitzkrieg and scorched earth policy of wall-to-wall Tesco and Stewart Milne-like developments that will make our wee country a world leader in town planning, hopefully with me at the helm once wee Jimmy Mackinnon retires!

In praise of Neil Baxter and the RIAS!

2011-09-21T21:26:00.008+01:00

You know, I've been doing a little research today on Neil Baxter, the illustrious head of the Royal Incorporation of Architects in Scotland or RIAS for short. He came to my attention this morning when he publicly exposed himself to the pretentious, snobbish and elitist modernist hordes on Urban Realm and Twitter by praising and defending the wonderful designs for Dr Donald Trump's new Clubhouse at Menie prepared by servant architect Gareth Hopkins with the assistance of Acanthus Architects based in Torry, a slum near Aberdeen. This is the link to the Scotsman article.

Secretary & Treasurer of the RIAS, Neil was previously principal of his own architectural and interpretation consultancy and Development Director of GBPT. He has lectured on urbanism, written for The Daily Telegraph, Herald, Sunday Herald, Homes & Interiors and the AJ, and is a frequent media spokesman so he knows his onions, so to speak.

Neil wrote 'The Wee Green Book', a history of Glasgow Green, co-authored Pat Lally’s 'Lazarus Only Done it Once', edited the Glasgow medieval history, 'A Tale of Two Towns', the monograph 'Matt Steele, Architect, A Biography' and 'A Life in Cities', the autobiography of David Mackay (MBM, Barcelona). In May 2008, Neil received Glasgow’s Lord Provost’s Award for services to heritage. All in all, his CV is an impressive mouthful and he is more than qualified to speak on matters of design.

Now I have to say at the outset that I am not stalking Neil but he does seem like a nice chap - good looking and intelligent, with extraordinary taste and judgement. He is also very brave as his defence of this marvellous building will surely bring calls for his resignation as a betrayer, a whited sepulchre and a modernist denier. Humph! More likely he will be called to the Trump HQ at Menie to prostate himself at the feet of the great one himself and be lathered with sumptuous gifts. For my part, I wish Neil all the best and commend him and his organisation to everyone who is interested in Scottish Architecture and Planning.

Menie Clubhouse - a work of genius

2011-09-20T17:55:00.010+01:00

You know, it was only the other day that I was recounting the wonderful stream of good news from Aberdeen where just north of the city, God's Own Golf Course is taking shape at Menie. Today, I have to report the fantastically breathtaking news that the designs for the new Clubhouse have been announced on Urban Realm, the premier portal for news and gossip about planning, architecture and the dynamic Scottish property industry.

Well! I'm sure you're all completely taken aback by the magnificence of the design by Gareth Hopkins, Trump's supine architect. The inspiration for this was obviously one of these old secondary schools from Ellon or some other Aberdeenshire slum but it has been updated with modern detailing which will give it 'visual and tactile clues'. A clever move on young Gareth's part and clearly a strategic move towards winning work from the Prince's Foundation at some of their Theme Park developments around the country.

Of course the design has been criticised by the usual bunch of elitist know-all architects who are all blind to the critical excellence of the design. You can read the comments on Urban Realm here - absurd I know - but the interesting fact is that Gareth Hopkins has for some strange but generous reason stated that this is the work of Acanthus Architects, a firm that I have never heard of. I assume that this is a made-up name and that they are a figment of the imagination.

All in all, this is great news for Aberdeenshire, for Dr Donald Trump and for Gareth Hopkins whose future as a Theme Park designer is assured. I have put another gold star in my notebook against this project and will sleep happily tonight in the knowledge that there are more good things to come from this neck of the woods. 10/10!

PS A day later, and the Scotsman newspaper's article here is just great too - this guy Neil Baxter knows what he's talking about

Triple Kirks for the chop! Aberdeen rejoices!

2011-09-17T15:06:00.013+01:00

You know, I've been thunderstruck by some of the developments in the past few months across in the great city of Aberdeen. The spectacular God's Own Golf Course takes shape out at Menie, fine tuned by my hero Dr Donald Trump. Union Terrace Gardens is set to be flattened at last - or should I say filled up - but either way it will be an improvement over the rat filled slum that is there at the moment.

But one of the things that has really caught my attention is the proposal by one of the Aberdeen area's greatest ever entrepreneur's, Wee Stewartie Milne! An admirer recently alerted me to the Triple Kirks Development slap bang next to Union Terrace Gardens and I've shown an image of the proposal above - fantastic isn't it? This landmark development will offer 72,000 sq ft of the highest quality Grade A office accommodation right in the heart of Aberdeen City - amazing!

The Triple Kirks were unique in Scotland in being three separate yet adjoining churches sharing a common steeple - the Wee Free and the Episcopalian churches couldn't afford their own steeples so they decided to use the Church of Scotland's one. Now fortunately the original buildings have deteriorated over the years and most were demolished some time ago. Sadly though, the steeple remains and is a blot on the landscape and an impediment to development in the hands of lesser people. But due to the sheer brilliance of Wee Stewartie Milne and his incredibly skilled team of world class architects led by, you guessed it...Halliday Fraser Munro..., an amazing composition of new buildings has been assembled around the old spire. Fantastic! With HFM leading this team, this is a roll out of talent that has world famous starchitects quaking in their boots - I'm reliably informed.

Now I'm sure you are all very wise and worldly people out there so you won't need to be told that when it comes to working on site, the church steeple will be history - demolished in an 'unfortunate accident' so don't think the development will be compromised by this miserable bit of old Aberdeen. Together with the huge retail development proposed for Union Terrace Gardens, this will drive Aberdeen forward and ahead of every other city in Europe. Everything Wee Stewartie Milne touches turns to gold, just like his longstanding involvement in Aberdeen Football Club which saw it just escape relegation last season. It is currently putting in a stellar performance at second bottom of the Scottish Premier League so this is an improvement by any measure.

Personally I look forward to this development being implemented and my hearty congratulations go out to all those involved - a big tick and a gold star in my notebook!

Public art disease found in Coatbridge

2011-09-11T15:50:00.009+01:00

You know, an admirer of mine sent me this nice wee photie of something terrible that has happened at Blair Bridge in Coatbridge next to the Monkland Canal. It's another piece of work by cliché artist Andy Scott, this time commemorating the work of renowned comic book writer Mark Millar, who grew up in the town. The six-metre high steel archway shows a character called Captain Coatbridge and two female superheroes - it was commissioned as part of on-going efforts to regenerate the canal but it looks really out of place to me against the old stonework of the canalside. I hope a lot of you are saying, "Oh no! Not another metal thing-me - please make it go away!"

Andy is probably making a good living producing all these bits of welded up steel - and goodness knows we all have to make a living somehow. I wrote earlier this year that one of his works, positioned on a roundabout, had been successfully destroyed by a drunk driver (fantastic wasn't it?) but unfortunately there is no word of others biting the dust. It's very sad for our nice wee country that we only seem to have one artist - he crops up in Cumbernauld, on the M8 at Baillieston, at Port Glasgow, almost everywhere, including Lomondgate! And because they are all done in the same galvanised finish, they look like bits of motorway signs that have been misplaced. Soon people will be saying that their towns are quite distinctive because they don't have a bit of scrap metal stuck in the middle of a roundabout.

Spare a thought though for poor Andy. I'm sure he is a creative sort of person so it must be really boring for him to be churning the same old stuff out all day long for every commission. So if I can give him a wee bit of advice it would be to stop doing these metal motorway signs and bits of horses and find another look for his stuff.

But in fact you will usually find that town planners are involved in commissioning public art so the blame can be laid at their door. I think this is a disgrace for a profession already on its knees as a result of incompetence by the goons in London and their inability to adopt the wisdom of the market economy in dealing with regeneration. All this public art stuff is a sideshow that the real movers and shakers in this country will avoid at all costs. So my advice to the RTPI Borg is to stop commissioning public art and get on with some real work.

Sensible SEPA - magnificent MAXIM

2011-09-10T14:08:00.008+01:00

Hello friends, colleagues and enemies. I've decided to return to the fray for the next few months to bring you some more of my unique and insightful views on planning, architecture and the Scottish property industry. So much has happened since my last post but I won't go over much of that old ground. Instead I will pick some of the highlights of the year so far. You won't be surprised to hear that one of the most important events was the deal between SEPA (the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency) and MAXIM, the totally magnificent business park which I had previously referred to as Eurocentral.

According to the Herald back in July, MAXIM signed SEPA as its anchor tenant after more than six months of talks. It's taken a long time to get to this point but that isn't surprising - a development so magnificent in its cutting edge design and avant-guardness that it hasn't even made it into the pages of most architectural magazines, won't sell out in the first week. That of course is the meaning of avant guard - so 'out there' that the multitude don't even know about it. And I can tell you now that most architectural critics are struggling to find cliches to describe it! It is the work of Keppies of course, a personal favourite of mine and one of Scotland's greatest box ticking and innovative companies, able to beat off any incomers when it comes to procurement, cheap developer-friendly design with an international feel and they are truly thought leaders in the world of greenbelt developments and pushing out the boundaries of the city into useless farm land.

Now SEPA have really nailed their colours to the mobile phone mast this time! The protector of Scotland's environment has chosen an out of town location with endless car parking and easy access to motorways for it's new premises. Remember that one of MAXIM's greatest selling points is that you can go there by car without any worries about congestion or parking! Staff can have barbeques in the woods at lunchtime and help to drive wildlife from land that would be better used for development. Saying no to so-called sustainable but outdated city centre locations by closing offices in East Kilbride and moving 350 workers from Edinburgh, Stirling and Perth is a major slap in the face for the long haired sandal-wearing hippies who favour public transport and other daft ideas. SEPA have risen considerably in my estimation and I'm sure have a great future. Let's hope that other organisations follow their good example.

Glasgow School of Art - some new thinking

2011-03-29T16:10:00.014+01:00

You know, sometimes the most obvious things in the world escape people because they are blinded by history, tradition and habit. Two of my fans wrote to me last week suggesting that I should write a review of the proposed new building for Glasgow School of Art. As you can imagine, I was delighted that my expert view on this matter was sought but at the same time, I was horrified to uncover the real truth of what is happening on Garterhill and the sloppy thinking that has dogged the project so far.

So last night I settled down to write this post while listening to a cassette tape of The Lark Ascending by one of my favourite German composers, Ralph Von Williams - marvellous stuff! First of all some basics. The proposal will be constructed on the site of two wonderful buildings by Keppie Henderson and Partners - the Newbery Tower and the Foulis Building. I'm trying not to show bias here - as you all know, Keppies is an all time favourite of mine - but it is quite ridiculous to contemplate the demolition of these fine structures, especially when an older building across the street is apparently to be kept.

Now I've heard all about Mackintosh - in fact I always carry one of his raincoats in my briefcase - but he should not be regarded with any respect. After all he slunk off from Scotland to work in England for a bit, then went to France to do a bit of painting and decorating - so he was effectively a tax exile!

The Art School needs more space - that seems clear. Doubtless they also need space for student parking and that sort of thing. I wonder if they have thought of moving to a greenfield site or perhaps a business park where there is plentiful parking? Probably not because they are wedded to that old wreck of a building on Garterhill. But such a plan would release their multiple sites in the area for more profitable uses and the dynamic Scottish property development industry would welcome such a proposal.

Now in relation to the proposed new building I must say I like it! It has presence and it is strikingly contemporary and large, towering over its insignificant neighbour across the street but, and that is a big but, it is facing the wrong way! The obvious answer is to demolish the Mackintosh building, keep the far superior Keppie buildings and build the Stephen Hall building on the site of the old Art School. Job done - problem solved.

The Enemies of Enterprise

2011-03-12T20:35:00.011Z

You know, I was trembling with excitement when I read the latest discussions about the planning system in England in Planning this week - apologies if you can't access this because you are not an expert planner like me! Down south, planning is regarded as being a major barrier to economic expansion. It's just what I have been saying for a few years now and of course, much of this free-range thinking has been adopted in Scotland for some time now with major developments like Edinburgh's Garden District getting the nod from the Scottish Government without a planning application even being submitted. Fantastic!

The Tory Vince Cable said, "I hear countless stories of perfectly reasonable developments being thwarted by bizarre planning rules. We want the standard answer to be yes - not no". Well actually the standard answer is yes or yes..subject to and sometimes no so that shows how much he knows. And on the same day, Cable also implied that the planning system was a major contributory factor to the recession down south. Nothing to do with the banks at all! Nothing to do with lack of borrowing opportunities! Just planning holding everything back. And last weekend while I was writing about MIPIM and wondering why my daffodils hadn't come up, David Cameron was talking about the "town hall officials who take forever with those planning decisions that can be make or break for a business" - they are among the "enemies of enterprise" who must be identified and destroyed.

Now you and I know this is just political posturing - but at the same time, the writing is on the wall for many of these enemies of enterprise - we see enough of them here in Auchterness! Let's think about the Enemies of Enterprise in Scotland - in fact, let's make a list:

local government officers who spend more time reading the Sun and drinking Irn Bru at their desks than dealing with planning applications
planning officials who refuse to take brown envelopes and holidays abroad as part of the Planning Gain agreements
development management staff who turn down invitations from developers to accompany them to lap dancing clubs
community activists who have issues around personal hygiene or who wear sandals and grey corduroy trousers
overweight women in brightly coloured cardigans who shout at developers during public meetings
noisy children carrying placards and dropping litter
anyone from Newton Mearns (the middle class slum near Glasgow)

These people represent a small proportion of the population yet they have a disproportionately negative effect on business, enterprise and property development - in fact they are clearly destroying the country. I have identified them - who will take them on?

Scotland - no money for a good time at MIPIM

2011-03-06T12:09:00.016Z

You know, at this time of year when the sap is rising and a healthy young man's thoughts turn to property development (and other things), it is just as well that MIPIM 2011 is just round the corner. After a long hard winter of doing deals, flattening historic buildings, devastating greenbelt and building masses of breeding boxes for the plebs or shiny new business parks for the plutocracy, it's natural that the property development industry should look to shake the dust from its portfolios and head for the sun.

Now for you ignoramuses out there, MIPIM (Marché International des Professionnels d'Immobilier) is the world's greatest trade show for international property development and takes place annually in Cannes, attracting almost 20,000 participants from almost 70 countries. In reality it is one big party! Of course I'm sure that some deals are done and doubtless some servant architects will make connections with new clients and hope that they win a big job. But for most it is allegedly about drink, drugs and sex.

There is an interesting article in the Sunday Herald today (not online) about Scotland's non-attendance at MIPIM this year. There will be no official representation by Government, public agencies like the beleaguered Scottish Enterprise or Councils - with the exception of Edinburgh who are going of course. Also some Scottish firms will definitely be there as the lure of those scantily clad Russian maidens plying their wares is too strong to keep young property folk in Scotland during a dull overcast March.

So perhaps the message has got through to public agencies about the alleged orgies and drunken capering at MIPIM. On one hand it is a national disgrace that Scotland is not represented on the Riviera. On the other hand, some say that it is not always easy to point to an instant return from such an event - well try telling that to the well known property executive who needed a course of injections when he came home or the prominent local government officer whose wife found some unusual female under-garments in his suitcase on returning home. I've never been to MIPIM unfortunately so I wouldn't know - but I would leap at the opportunity of course! Scottish Enterprise says that 'restricted budget availability' is the reason for their non-appearance. Maybe they are just not up to it anymore!

An Unnecessary Rethink

2011-02-15T19:43:00.011Z

You know, after the shambolic and inaccurate mess of my post last night I thought I would try to make amends by writing about an important study which has been brought to my attention by the amazing Bell and Scott's daily delivery of sector knowledge. Bell and Scott have one of the best doorways through which you can view the dynamic Scottish property development industry at work.

Today, they opened the door onto the Draft Area Development Framework for Edinburgh Waterfront and Leith, an area I had previously referred to as an epicentre of dynamic growth. This smouldering hotpot of development has been one of Scotland's development success stories and, like Glasgow Harbour, it is totally unique. The command that Forth Ports and Clydeport have exercised over their respective harbour areas is truly world class.

So it is quite remarkable that the City of Edinburgh Council, assisted by the highly secretive organisation known as A+DS (shortly to be wound up in all probability), the Prince's Foundation and others have decided to 'refresh' the plans for the Waterfront. The report states that, "The sites at the waterfront are among the most significant development opportunities in Europe. Unfortunately, some of the developments first approved and developed at the beginning of the 2,000s have failed to meet this expectation. As a consequence, it is evident that it will take considerably longer for development in the waterfront 'areas of change' at Leith, Newhaven and Granton to be fully realised. Also, some of the recent development models will no longer be desirable in the present financial climate." To my mind this is saying that the previous work has been a failure - how can that be? Incredible! So now they've decided to sit around with Prince Charles eating Duchy Originals, scribble up a few plans and write a big report. What for?

Anyway one of the interesting things about this report is the language. You know, we expert planners are always keen to talk about strings of pearls, green fingers and the like. This time we have a beating heart, a Great Street and a Merchant City. In fact we have a number of beating hearts, presumably accompanied by a twinkle in the eye, cauliflower ears and a club foot though I haven't been able to find them yet. This is all meant to confuse the public of course because the last thing planners need is interference from the local community and certainly the development industry will be anxious to avoid having to deal with busybodies wearing sandals and brightly coloured cardigans. Not surprisingly though, news of this story in the Scotsman has caused an eruption of antagonism in the comments section which is well worth reading. If anyone seriously wonders why we planners like to avoid consultation just read this!

In my view, Edinburgh has made a big mistake in refreshing the plans for the waterfront areas. What can the Prince's Foundation possibly know that global design firms like RMJM and others don't know? RMJM have prepared highly regarded plans for their private sector masters and managed to ignore community wishes along the way - an excellent strategy that has borne fruit in Glasgow Harbour. This is a waste of public money and will lead nowhere.

For what it's worth, you can download the report from here.

Goodbye, Man in Motion

2011-02-14T19:17:00.009Z

You know, my professional and personal lives has been so completely dismal over the past few weeks that I haven't had the energy to contribute anything to the Scottish Planning scene. I won't go into all of that for now as I'm determined to be positive. But just when I was feeling so down yesterday, I read the fantastic news that cliché artist Andy Scott's awful Man in Motion installation had been largely destroyed in a car accident. Isn't that great? By the way, I was very remiss in not crediting Delphwynd with taking the great wee photie on the right above - you can see more of his work here and thanks for letting me use it!

Now first of all, I hope no one was hurt in this incident. Police are still investigating so they haven't come out and said openly what everyone knows is the truth - that this was a deliberate piece of sabotage aimed at undermining the regeneration of Tullibody in Clakmannan- not the City of Dundee as I wrote earlier ( you see how stressed I am at the moment). I await confirmation of this with great interest and amusement. Of course it's ironic that Man in Motion should have been felled by a car - it just shows you that Clackmannan need to address the road safety agenda as well as all the other rubbish they spend money on.

I'll try to keep this brief because I'm still laughing. but I sincerely hope that this intervention was carried out deliberately by some nice wee middle class lady rather than by some drunken ned high on Buckfast in a stolen Vauxhall Nova. It's about time that good sensible people fought back at this patronising and ridiculous policy of providing Andy Scott with work whenever an area has been identified as a slum needing a good kick up the backside. See that rubbish Arria statue at Cumbernauld - it will be next. I hope it will be flattened by a thoughtful HGV driver.

The only cloud in this story is the prospect of Andy being brought in and paid a lot of money to repair the damage to his creation. Let sleeping sculptures lie I say. Down with public art!

And apologies to everyone for getting my geography so wrong - I am an idiot!

The Forfar Bridie versus proper food

2011-01-10T18:16:00.005Z

You know, there's a really juicy piece of news around in the welfare town of Forfar at the moment. I was alerted to this by my personal copy of Bell and Scott's sector review which arrived in my inbox at lunchtime. Apparently it's another case of a group of locals unwilling to bow to the inevitable and acknowledge that traditional ways of shopping are history. All this angst and hand wringing has been brought about because a multi-million-pound Asda superstore has been given the planning green light after town councillors found themselves out on a limb in opposing the development. So long old shops! Your time is up! Fantastic!!

The supermarket giant hailed approval for a store which they hope will create more than 250 jobs, bring in a £20 million-plus annual turnover and take the trade war to rival Tesco, which it has been claimed is scooping up more than 70% of Forfar's shopping spend. Well it won't create 250 jobs - that is just window dressing - but the principle of the survival of the fittest, the up and coming monumental battle between Tesco and Asda (our modern day giants of retail) and the destruction of old shops owned by old people selling unpalatable food is completely sound in my view. So the Forfar Bridie won't be featuring in Asda's plans. It too will be history and not before time. That's another box ticked!

But wait - there's more! Now Asda are a canny bunch of operators - and I'm very fond of their sausages - so when it came to planning gain, they got away with only £38,000 worth of landscaping and road improvements. Considering how much money they will make from the store it's got to be one of the best bargains so far in 2011. So much for the Council planners fighting for the best result for Forfar - they were maybe keen to get a job at Asda. After all, their own jobs will disappear soon.

A final point. I haven't seen the drawings for this proposal but I'm certain that it will be a thing of great beauty. A crisp metal-clad box glinting in the sunshine and sending out rays of retail goodwill to Forfar's destitute populace and extending further afield to the droves of English hippies living in black houses and old railway carriages throughout the miserable Angus countryside. Forfar will now jump straight from the 19th century to the 21st century - an amazing achievement. So a gold star and 9/10 points in my new notebook - plus a big tick.

Happy New Year!

2011-01-08T17:07:00.007Z

Happy New Year to all my thousands of readers and of course, each and every one of you is special! I hope you're ready for an exciting ride through the wonders of planning in Scotland.

I arrived back in the office on Wednesday 5th but by lunchtime, there was some unsettling gossip about things that I dare hardly think about. My own position here at Auchterness may be under review as a result of stringent cutbacks in public expenditure and there is talk of ‘sun-setting’ the entire operation. I can’t believe that this will happen as we are a critical component of the country’s public-private sector partnerships and widely known as ‘thought leaders’ in the field of regeneration and renewal. There is no need for anyone to be cast down or worry about our future - I give you my word on that, but I will of course keep you informed of developments.

A couple of things of a more jovial nature. Firstly, did you happen to see the mad story about the Burntisland Clock and the ludicrous goings on at Fife Council? One miserable local person complained about the noise of the town clock chimes so Fife Council removed the chimes. Crazy! Then about 200 people gathered in Burntisland the following evening to demonstrate against the removal of their clock chimes after 150 years. Then 1,100 signed a petition calling for the chimes to be restored. They even have a Facebook page - I've joined in the fun just for badness! It’s a great story about the minefield of local democracy in action and is perfect evidence of all the terrible things I’ve been saying about giving local people their say. Just don’t listen to them - that’s my advice! And certainly don't ask them in the first place!

Secondly, and as they used to say in Private Eye, I had to peel an onion when I received the sad news the other day that Planning magazine is moving to a fortnightly format - what a terrible thing to happen to the magazine nobody reads - and they're getting a new editor to help breathe some life into it. After the tears were flowing freely I started laughing of course as really this is a major setback for the goons in London. It’s just what you would expect to happen when they have a woman president - it wouldn’t have happened on a man’s watch would it? With any luck it will move to a monthly format then quietly die off - no one will care of course. It’s a profession without a future as long as the goons in London are in charge.

Aberdeenshire is the place to be!

2010-12-27T12:57:00.009Z

Well I told you so! This morning, the papers and the internet are full of the fantastic, life-affirming news that Aberdeenshire has been named as the place in Scotland which offers the best quality of life for the second year running. Aberdeenshire was said to rate highly as residents tend to be fit and well, with 93% reporting good health; the employment rate and pay is high; and the weather is better than in other areas.

Now I’m not surprised at all by this great news. I’ve been banging on for ages about the revolution taking place in the north east of Scotland as a result of the work of Dr Donald Trump, Sir Ian Woods, Aberdeen Football Club and Halfords as well as other giants of the retail park like Lidl, Argos and Homebase. It's the future of Scotland in miniature and everywhere else had better catch up quickly! It’s a part of Scotland that only sees green lights for an amazing new range of developments marching over the green belt, just like a Martian Invasion - only better!

So the massed forces of the media and the entire population of the north east of Scotland will be delighted to hear that the Auchterness Award for The Greatest Place Ever in 2010 goes to Aberdeenshire.

But what of the other areas that were supposedly in contention? Shetland and Orkney feature because according to the report, “These areas score well on high employment rates, low population densities and burglary rates, small class sizes and good secondary school exam results.” Well the obvious response to low burglary rates is that in these other areas there is nothing worth stealing - an old pair of Wellington boots or the bit of rusty chain that keeps the collie dog from trying to swim to the mainland. And small class sizes? You would be pushed to have large class sizes in these places because hardly anyone lives there!

Elsewhere it seems that east is important - East Dunbartonshire, East Lothian and East Renfrewshire so if you want to live in a good area, perhaps make sure it has East in its name.

But back to Aberdeenshire and some final points. The picture at the top of this post, courtesy of PA and the BBC, shows a winter landscape with wind farms in the background near Inverurie - scene of one of my terrific posts last year. Now wind farms have been a theme of mine in a couple of recent posts - they represent enterprise and a new modern Scottish landscape. Climate is also important - the north east gets a lot of snow and they tend to have proper winters which is good for wee beasties hibernating properly (I read recently). So if you are a nature lover in Aberdeenshire, while some of your favourite frogs will be sleeping safely in their burrows over the winter, don’t be surprised if others have to face the Grim Reaper - it’s only natural.

Of course it’s the same for towns and villages - some will, and should perish as their life drains away to more modern locations which are better positioned and more prosperous. And this is certainly happening to some of the welfare towns and villages in Scotland as we speak. But that’s all for now - well done Aberdeenshire!

Merry Christmas Everyone

2010-12-24T10:58:00.002Z

Well it's Christmas Eve and the whole world seems to be shutting down. Auchterness never sleeps though and I'll be keeping my eyes open for new developments and things that will surely interest you as we canter towards New Year.

I will miss Bell and Scott's daily Sector Knowledge newsletter (the last one till the 5th of January was yesterday) and I urge each and every one of you to sign up for it now. It's the clearest possible view into the future of Scotland, transformed into a dynamic new country on the back of market led development without restraint.

Anyway, I hope you like my wee Christmas Tree - I put it up last night and I'm very proud of it. I hope you all have a Merry Christmas, including all those who have been cruel and insulting to me over the past year. Please keep dropping in to Auchterness where you're always welcome. I'll put the kettle on and we'll have a wee blether.

With every best Christmas wish - yours in planning.

Dave T

It's a load of rubbish for Newton Mearns!

2010-12-23T13:02:00.007Z

You know, it was gratifying to read of the impending battle between the middle class snobs of Newton Mearns south of Glasgow and Lifetime Recycling Village Ltd, a company which aims to process some 1.5 million tonnes of commercial and industrial rubbish at a former farm just off the M77 south of the dreamy slum suburb. The company claims that the rubbish dump will have the capacity to generate enough electricity to power 100,000 homes.

This is fantastic news and yet another example of how Scotland is moving forward towards increasing self sufficiency in energy production. But it's also a typical class battle in which a small section of nimbyish middle class folk try to deny the rest of Scotland the opportunity to recycle waste and produce power from it. Apart from those living in a huge council estate there which is at the hub of the community, it won't have dawned on the other good folk of Newton Mearns, who heat their SUVs in the garage at night and who have special fridges for their white wine, that their actions are undermining the whole concept of a Smart Sustainable and Successful Scotland - it makes me sick. . They are also blind and deaf to the wildlife opportunities of the tip and the potential for new habitat creation which can attract a range of new environments for seagulls and a host of cuddly small animals which make their homes in the rubbish.

I wonder if it has occurred to the owners of the Lifetime Recycling Village (a very good combination of three key buzzwords by the way) that these good folk can easily be bought off. You only need to read my article on the monetisation of planning to realise that this is ideal territory to hand out Waitrose vouchers, memberships of exclusive wine clubs, nail bars and other desirable personal services. Opposition to the proposal could collapse overnight because all these folk care about is money - especially property values.

You see, the other side of a Smart Successful and Sustainable Scotland is a Self-interested, Short-sighted and Selfish Scotland. Let battle commence!

Two South Lanarkshire town centres doomed!

2010-12-21T14:37:00.018Z

As Christmas approaches and the office runs down for the year, I'm usually left to mind the shop while others take a sickie to do some last minute shopping. At lunchtime today, I received my personal email from Bell and Scott giving me the run down on some of the best property development proposals around. I clicked on the top link entitled 'Creation of a community' and almost choked on my sandwich - here we have an absolutely stunning new proposal which is important in all sorts of ways and is truly a thing of great beauty.

You know, many people write to me and ask, "Dave, how did you become such an expert on town planning? How can you tell when something is important? How do you separate the wheat from the chaff?" Of course it takes years of experience working at the coalface of cutting-edge development but you also need to have a nose for a good project. It's like good wine in a way - I discovered Blue Nun many years ago and because it was such a sound choice, I haven't felt the need to change my taste. So when I saw this proposal for a place called Newton, close to Rutherglen and Cambuslang in South Lanarkshire I saw straight away that it was a winner.

Okay, let's have a detailed look at this from my expert planner's perspective. First of all Taylor Wimpey and Ashfield Land say they are delighted that South Lanarkshire Council have unanimously granted planning permission for this mixed-use regeneration scheme at Two74 Cambuslang Road in Glasgow. I'll bet they're delighted - it's the ultimate Christmas present! The development will be anchored by a major food store and will also offer restaurants, a nine storey 170 room hotel, 9 screen cinema, 50,000 sq ft sport retail, 55,000 sq ft of employment with over 800 car spaces. The value of the scheme is £50 million for a site covering 20 acres. Incredible! Note the use of certain important words here - 'mixed-use regeneration' and 'anchored' for example. These guys are serious.

Now of course, this is basically a new town centre that will see off the existing centres of Cambuslang and Rutherglen in one fell swoop. That is exactly why South Lanarkshire Council approved it - so that they don't need to bother propping up the existing knackered centres with facelift schemes, public art or other cynical urbanistic placebos. It's actually quite common for planners to do this these days though they won't admit it openly.

So once again, the market has triumphed - the old is erased from the earth and the brand new, profit-creating development is welcomed in - in fact planning permission was just a formality as usual these days. No one was going to stop this magnificent beast from proceeding!

But there's more - the scheme will be known as Two74 and lies at Junction 2 of the M74, which is currently being extended to link Glasgow to Europe, and of course is in close proximity to the site of the Commonwealth Games taking place in 2014 when our cousins from many foreign parts will come to entertain us with their dancing and strange customs.

I have given this development a gold star and a big tick with 9 out of 10 in my little notebook. My hearty congratulations to everyone involved.

Greed is good for planners

2010-12-19T00:37:00.015Z

You know, I was speaking to one of my friends in industry this week who told me that green shoots of recovery are beginning to show in his garden. I can tell you, it was so refreshing to hear people talking again about the way in which the market provides for the country, how big is good, how profit-making and profit-taking is a natural human instinct, yes - just like greed, and of the will of enterprise to fight communities who think it is their business to block development of any kind. Yes, I was literally quivering with excitement as you can imagine - so much so that I got out my personal copy of the Project Scotland Year Planner Wall Chart and wrote 'REMEMBER TO FIGHT THE LOCAL COMMUNITY' at the start of each week of 2011 to remind me of what was worthwhile and good.

Here we have a typical unemployed community activist. Now don't get me wrong. I don't dislike the locals around here but I do hate all their talk about small things - a nice wee meeting room, a wee allotment, a wee bit of social enterprise, a wee hub with wifi - you know what I mean. Then there's all the green talk about cosying up to frogs and buttercups, creating habitats everywhere, damming streams and letting beavers run riot with bears and wolves across the countryside - a hazard to road users. It doesn't stop there of course - before you know it, top planners like me will have to get permission from the community to go to the toilet. Intolerable!

Well things are going to be different for the great unwashed in 2011 - believe me. First of all, 50% of them won't have a job as they will have been made redundant by the Council. Wee Fat Alex Salmond will probably repatriate the English so there won't be so many trouble makers around. But most important, developers will be able to buy off local Councils and community groups with offers of cash and inducements, including free pie suppers from the local chip shop. Some say that this marks a radical change in the way that the development industry operates - but does it really?

Planning has always been corrupt - developers have always bunged councillors or officials a holiday, a wee trip or sexual favours for planning permission. That's what makes the world go round. Soon all this will be out in the open. It's been called the monetisation of planning. People get in the way - they get paid to clear off. A Council gets a bag of money for allowing development - a wee trip to MIPIM included. A local community get sunbeds and au pairs to shut up and smile as more fields are ploughed up for volume builder housing. It's great!

It's a fantastically brilliant idea that comes from the Tories down south - aren't they just great at oiling the wheels of industry? Big is good. Greed is good. Small is ugly and green is uglier. The sooner these ideas take root in Scotland the better!

What Donald Trump meant to say...

2010-12-16T20:41:00.008Z

You know, an article in the Press and Journal last week has put me in a brown study for the past few days - is it inaccurate or mischievous? One thing I do know is that it is certainly untrue and probably a misunderstanding. The Great Dr Donald Trump is reported to have clashed with rival developers over plans to build a windfarm off the stretch of north-east coastline where he is creating his magnificent £750 million golf resort. Dr Donald is quoted as saying, “These turbines, if ever built, will in one fell swoop destroy Scotland’s magnificent natural heritage. They are noisy, unsightly and we will oppose the siting of this windfarm vehemently. Every component of our project is based upon sea views and we cannot allow the construction of what is tantamount to 11 65-storey structures off our beautiful coastline.”

This must be rubbish - it is a fabrication invented by the press to smear my hero at a time when he is being hounded by the media because of his successful dispute with some old coffin-dodger. In detail, a pensioner threatened with eviction and a legal bill of up to £50,000 after she tried to block Donald Trump’s north-east golf course has lodged an appeal with the European Court of Human Rights. I haven't reported on this as it is so unimportant and unworthy of your interest. But the press have seized on this of course despite Dr Donald's great love for old people and his kindness and generosity to the people of the north east of Scotland who will benefit in a thousand ways from his new golf course and associated developments. In other words, they have forgotten about the economic argument and foregrounded the issue of the coffin-dodger. Disgraceful!

Now let me tell you why there is no dispute between Trump and the wind farm developers. As I explained in a recent post, wind farms are a big asset in the landscape and represent the modern face of the country and its economy. In addition, there's a pile of money to be made from wind farms - they are part of the renewable energy economy, which incidentally also keeps a lot of my planning colleagues in their Mercs and BMWs.

Donald knows these things as he is not stupid. What he is actually saying is, "These turbines, when they are built, will in one fell swoop immensely improve Scotland’s magnificent natural heritage. They are quiet, beautiful and we will support the siting of this wind farm vehemently. Every component of our project is based upon sea views and to actually see something beautiful instead of the dreary North Sea will be an enormous boost to our project. They are just like eleven magnificent 65-storey structures off our beautiful coastline.”

So you see, you can't believe everything you read, even in the Press and Journal.

Vagrants and jakies to visit the big cities

2010-12-13T18:43:00.011Z

You know, I don't often write about public transport as I prefer my car but I'm making an exception today because of the great news that was quietly announced over the weekend for junkies and alkies across Central Scotland. Yes, the Airdrie to Bathgate railway link has been completed, allowing vagrants and jakies from the welfare villages of Caldercruix, Armadale and Blackridge to visit Glasgow and Edinburgh. But if their ambitions are not quite of a metropolitan leaning, they can visit Airdrie, Coatbridge or Bathgate instead for their methadone and Super-Lager.

It cost £300m to re-establish this passenger service between North Lanarkshire and West Lothian enabling the plebs to visit the big cities of Scotland for the first time in 54 years. The new 15-mile track allows trains to run all the way from the West of Scotland through Glasgow Queen Street to Edinburgh, via Airdrie and Bathgate. That's a lot of money to undo the good deeds of Dr Beeching isn't it? I mean if there were any respectable people living in these forgotten airts, they would surely have a Mercedes, a BMW or a big fancy Jaguar like some of the property surveyors I know, so they would never use the train. The idea that the creative classes of Blackridge and Armadale can be literally fast-tracked to the Edinburgh Festival seems ridiculous to me and is a complete waste of public money.

Moreover, some of the wonderful examples of public art along the route, which had become a cycleway for nature lovers and perverts, have been destroyed. It's a badly thought out scheme in many other ways - for example the route runs through the proposed Protestant Village known as Edinburgh's Garden District designed by Rangers FC owner Sir David Murray but there is apparently to be no station which would enable residents to get to Ibrox or Tynecastle more easily. Little things like that have been ignored in the planning of this linear white elephant.

Wee Fat Alex Salmond seems to be playing with his electric train set instead of pump priming the economy by supporting more retail developments - this is disgraceful at a time of national crisis and clearly, this £300M could have been better spent.

My Christmas talk to the schoolkids

2010-12-11T20:48:00.008Z

You know, it's always a great honour to be able to point young people in the right direction. It's a source of great sadness that I'm perhaps failing with my own son who is turning out to be a bully and a hooligan but there are special circumstances there relating to my beautiful wife and her young lover which I won't go into here.

Anyway, last week I gave the first of my Christmas talks to schoolkids and boy were they enraptured! Fantastic! Clearly they were filled with respect for me as an able and important person doing a much more difficult job than their teachers - or probably their parents too. I offered them a glimpse into the future and used it as an opportunity to explain in layman's terms, some of the business philosophy behind the Auchterness project. Here's a brief extract:

Good Morning trainee adults - how are you today? At Auchterness, we are all about our people and our values, constantly refocusing and concentrating on our cause. To be good at planning, you have to think outside of the box 24/7 and keep discussion on a high level. We must shift paradigms and walk the walk but once the final issues are resolved, we run a final meta go-no-go decision matrix, as maintaining the status quo is no longer an option. We touch base with our customers every day and push the envelope with a win-win philosophy but of course, it's time to backstop things if we ever feel we have lost control of what we are doing. Trying to get corporate approval is like herding cats of course.

We contribute positively to our community and environment although sometimes we have to guesstimate the deadline for this or that project. We take ownership of problems and don't pass the buck. We deal with great ideas during meetings or off-line. Embracing diversity as an essential component of the way we do business. We get together and really drill down on this as the need to alleviate our human capital is paramount. You are definitely not cool if your company is not running at internet speed.

We establish strategic partnerships with another entities by going back to our roots to connect the dots and focus on the low-hanging fruit. We are proactive - we run the skills matrix yes, but if we do not upskill ourselves, we may become unemployable. So breaking out of the victim mindset and engaging with business in a more positive and effective way is the way to go. We don't look at this as a problem but as an opportunity. We refocus and concentrate on our core business while realising that our competitive advantage is great customer service. We have the computing power and we have the intellectual infrastructure. We constantly operationalise our strategy starting with the historical data and after that, we can double-click on the proformas, double-checking that the customer is still in a good mood. Our core purpose is to provide an uplifting experience that enriches people's daily lives. Let's take a short bio-break before moving on to action plan the options.

Great isn't it? There was a tremendous round of applause when I finished and I felt uplifted, valued and just brilliant. I hope these kids have a really good Christmas when it comes.

A Planner's Bumper Fun Book #2 - Wind Farms

2010-12-08T21:54:00.006Z

You know, a lot of local authority planners get their knickers in a twist about wind farms - trying to block them in order to justify their pathetic existences. Well, a lot of planners in the private sector make a lot of money out of wind farms and I could name one who dines out on his retainer every week. Also a lot of people make money out of having wind farms on their land. So there we are - three compelling arguments for wind farms and I've barely started!

Okay so let's look at one of the main issues here - impact on the landscape. Now in Scotland we are a modern nation - it's just over ten years since we got our own parliament. A modern nation needs a modern landscape - it's logical really - and what could be more modern than a hillside covered in shiny new windmills! You just need to look at the nice wee photie above to realise how much the original dreary landscape has been improved with these glistening whirling dervishes. Add to that the simple fact that money is being made with every revolution of those fine blades and you can see that any argument is futile.

It's another example of planners holding the wrong end of the stick, trying to refuse perfectly good proposals, forcing public enquiries and generally being negative in the face of the development industry. I'll bet not one of them has stood on a wind farm in gale force winds and heard the deafening roar, the terrified stampede of sheep or the sound of seagulls being whacked by the huge blades. My goodness you almost feel that the whole hillside is taking off - it's so exciting. But this is the sort of thing that planners, aided and abetted by conservationists, naturalists - and I'm sure nudists and other perverts - are trying to stop. It's a disgrace!

So next time you see a big story in the papers about the merits of this or that wind farm proposal, just think that behind it, there is a horrible little specky planner in a tweed jacket trying to stir up trouble and stop technology advancing across our new nation's landscape. Praise the windmills and turbines of the future! Down with Council planners!

Coping with disappointment

2010-12-05T20:55:00.006Z

You know, when I received my personal copy of Planning on Friday I was underwhelmed to say the least. At £2.70 a copy it is grossly overpriced considering that there is usually nothing of interest in it so it's just as well I get it for nothing as a fully qualified planner. But this week they have published the results of their annual Planning Consultancy Survey - fascinating reading but with a big sting in the tail.

This year, Barton Willmore won top spot again in the leading employers category with a fee income of £18.1M for 2009-10. That makes them the Tesco of planning consultants I suppose. They've never worked for me but are due some respect I suppose. One of my all time favourites only managed to come in at =13th - the mighty Halcrow Group - with a fee income of £21M for 2009-10 - and to continue the supermarket and retail analogy, they are perhaps the Morrisons of the planning consultancy world. Nevertheless, that's £21,000,000 well spent on the thickest reports that you can put through a plastic ring binder these days so a very hearty congratulations to the clients who coughed up for this.

As I scanned down the list of top dogs, I became increasingly concerned about the absence of my favourite all-time planners - Keppie Design! Eventually I found them at =63rd with an undisclosed fee income. I couldn't believe it! I was downcast for most of Friday - Keppie Design appear to be the Lidl or the Iceland of the planning consultancy world and that hurts, I can tell you. At sixty-third equal, they have a long way to go and I will be writing to them to offer my help and full support in their climb to the top.

I got the boy yesterday and today. We've all had a lot of snow in the past few days so it was inevitable that he would use me as target practice for an almost constant bombardment of snowballs and the butt of practical jokes for the entire evening on Saturday. Normally I would join in the fun but the news about Keppies has cast a dark blanket of depression over me. I will shake this off though and put on my thinking cap to bring you a new item from the Planner's Bumper Fun Book in the next few days. So cheerio for now and stay warm.

Aberdeen are at it again...

2010-11-28T21:53:00.006Z

You know, I was thrilled to read recently that Aberdeen City Council have decided to set up a special company to develop Council owned assets and regenerate Aberdeen. It's called One Aberdeen - original name isn't it? Yes, but only if you ignore One North East and One NG - that's One Newcastle Gateshead for you ignorant types out there. It's a unique idea borrowed from other Councils in Scotland like Glasgow and Edinburgh.

This is fabulous news - One Aberdeen will fast-track supposed Council assets like libraries and cemeteries straight into the willing hands of private developers. It's a ploy that I suspect was suggested to the Council by Donald Trump or Sir Ian Woods. The One Aberdeen city development company will take Council assets which could be making money for the city, but are not - places like Union Terrace Gardens or the slums of Torry - and give them to private developers.

Apparently in the past, unused assets have been sold on to third parties, but under the new scheme they will be transferred to One Aberdeen for development and used to generate cash for the city, ensuring the people of Aberdeen, rather than a private body, benefit from the asset. Well that's what the press release says but in fact it's equivalent to flogging off the entire property portfolio - this will include the Beach, Union Street, all the sponsored roundabouts and the Duthie Park which will be redeveloped along with Hazlehead Park, the golf course there being given to Donald Trump.

One of the prime aims of the new company will be to drive and promote the regeneration and economic development of the city as a whole. This is exactly the right approach and will hopefully see acres of unused land flattened and used for housing, ring-roads and other assets. It is a sign that the dynamic duo - Dr Donald and Sir Ian - are beginning to have their way with the city. A thousand years of untold wealth and riches will inevitably follow!

A Planner's Bumper Fun Book #1 - Hotels

2010-11-26T21:13:00.011Z

You know, I'm often asked, "What do you actually do?" A very good question. Not that I'm in any doubt but it might be difficult for lesser beings to understand! So I thought I would write an occasional series of posts on some of the hot topics in the expert world of the fully qualified town planner. Here's Part 1 - the hotel.

Ok let's go! Now hotels are one of the most desirable items in the planners's bumper fun book. Think Monopoly - think Park Lane - okay? Let's talk Scotland - it comes down to two classic chains. Travelodge and Premier Inns. Fantastic! They are all over the place and their incestuous battle for supremacy is played out from Elgin to West Edinburgh. Like two Premier Division Football sides, these two giants of business provision knock each other around like an old couple but they are deadly serious.

Just look at my picture above of the Premier Inn at Dundee. Forget about the daft V&A proposals - this is the real thing. Imagine staying overnight at this succulent supplier of late night treats. Imagine standing naked at your window with your Mars Bar in the dead of night overlooking the silvery Tay with nothing between you and the river but a bit of double glazing, a luscious lawn and an asphalt path - fabulous! You have your own electric kettle for the night (maybe) and some tea-bags. But there's a machine in the hall to dispense soft drinks - it's an incredibly sophisticated offer!

So what's the link to planning and regeneration? Well it's obvious. Like public art which I've referred to before, a Travelodge or a Premier Inn is a sign that planners have been at work, 'enabling' as we say, oiling the wheels of business and ensuring that everything turns out well. A nice asphalt car park with white markings is a classic touch. The nice wee plants around the car park should be spikey so that crisp packets can get stuck on them - makes it easier for the Council layabouts to pick them up once or twice a year - and dense undergrowth is good for hiding beer cans. That's three boxes ticked and I've hardly started!

You often find that these hotels are build close to other important facilities like business parks, ten-pin bowling alleys, edge-of-town cinemas, supermarkets and upmarket restaurants like Frankie and Bennys. That's what we expert planners call a 'cluster of excellence' - good isn't it?

Of course there is a dark side to this success story. Sometimes these facilities are used by ladies of the night (although that might not be the case in Elgin - well I wouldn't advise anyone to try it). It's a sure sign that these developments are successful when uses that were once associated with town centres move to edge-of-town sites. It's another kick in the pants for the conservation lobby and others who oppose modern development. You know, many of my friends in Scottish Enterprise aspire to provide a Travelodge - they think it would be the pinnacle of a successful career - the ultimate bit of enabling. I agree!

So in summary, hotel developments like these are a clear sign of a successful area and a beacon of light, demonstrating the value of planning today.

Keppies to change Orkney for good!

2010-11-22T17:55:00.010Z

You know, I was over the moon today when I spotted the news on the Urban Realm website that Keppie Design have been commissioned to design Orkney Islands Council’s £50m Schools Investment Programme. By the way, Urban Realm is a favourite of mine for gossip and tittle-tattle around the development scene in Scotland and is especially known for its uncritical reporting. This is fantastic news and another kick in the teeth for some of Scotland's so-called boutique architecture firms as well as a big vote of confidence for this great company, fresh from its success at the Highland Housing Expo where they won my category of best house ever, in the world.

So let's have a look at what is being proposed here. The contract will see Keppie working with Morrison Construction - the building arm of the well known supermarket chain - to deliver a grammar school, theatre and halls of residence in Kirkwall, a primary school in Stromness, a leisure hall and squash courts at the Pickaquoy Centre and all weather sports pitches in Stromness and Kirkwall. It will be just as if the army had arrived there again to build camps, defences and other facilities at the start of World War II - except it will be different.

This is great news for Orkney which is struggling to find a contemporary identity in the 21st century. Black houses, mud huts and thatched roofed slums will be swept aside to create a new modern look for the islands. Brightly coloured cladding, plate glass, carpet tiles and other mod-cons will completely jerk the islanders out of their Victorian outfits and habits. It's a win-win situation for the Council and will herald a New Enlightenment for the islands in which people can read and write again. "Integrating the architecture with interior and landscape design Keppie will prioritise longevity and robustness given the vagaries of the Orkney climate whilst harnessing abundant natural energy", said Peter Moran, Director of Education at Keppie.

Wonderful and well spoken that man! I can tell you now, I wish I had been educated in a Keppies School - I might have turned out better! I congratulate the Council on their foresight in appointing such a great, stylish and appropriate firm of architects to undertake this important work and offer some hope for the future in this miserable part of Scotland.

My weekend with the boy

2010-11-21T21:26:00.012Z

So that's another weekend over and the boy has been given back to my beautiful wife and her young lover - I'll get him again on the 4th of December. It's a pleasant punctuation in my hectic life as one of the top planners in Scotland. The nice wee photie above is one for the family album - well I don't have much of a family or an album but I'll share it with you anyway. It was taken by the boy on Saturday as we sat in Burger King just next to the Vue Cinema at the ever gorgeous Inverness Shopping Park.

I didn't have time to write an in-depth assessment of the Shopping Park but I knew I was somewhere special. The way in which the cold prevailing winds drive people into the shops is a very clever touch. You will get an in-depth perspective from your favourite expert planner at a later date.

I was very tired after the drive and slept through most of the film - Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - which was not my cup of tea. While I was asleep, the boy stuck a big piece of chewing gum on my head and I didn't even notice to till we got back to the car. Oh how he laughed. There's a streak of badness in him which I think is being encouraged by his unfortunate home environment. I'm not sure what to do about this and I worry sometimes that he will end up in care or become a social misfit, a hooligan or even a Tory. I haven't seen his school report card but maybe they don't do that anymore. I do recognise though that he is rebelling against life and in some ways, I quite like that.

We spent Sunday morning in the garden - I was chopping wood as usual but instead of helping, he threw stones at some beer cans he had put up on the fence. I suggested that this wasn't the best thing to do but he just said, "Shut it Grandad". You know, it's tough being a father these days.

Three cheers for Lomondgate!

2010-11-18T20:36:00.012Z

You know, a friend of mine gave me a heads-up on this astonishing and ground breaking development in the Glasgow Herald today. I rushed out to buy it! I don't take the Herald regularly as it is sadly parochial - unlike the Press and Journal which is, what shall we say, just local, but the property pages today offer a mouthwatering selection of tasty treats so I might have to break the subscriptions budget and sign up for it!

Anyway, entitled Business park to bank on, (cleverly combining three words which mean so much to entrepreneurs today not to mention the general public), this article describes a stunner - a one hundred percenter right between the eyes. Lomondgate Business Park will transform the Vale of Leven and Loch Lomond into something unique and wonderful. Like a conflation of Trafford Park and Lake Como, this fires a big cannonball across the bows of other unique developments in Scotland. Businessmen will be speedboating up and down Loch Lomond with their mobiles glued to their ears! Balloch cafes will be filled with suits doing deals and all this enterprise will trickle down into local employment of course as I've explained before!

It's fantastic! Cliché artist Andy Scott has been commissioned to produce a stag sculpture as a dramatic entrance to the business park - it's just another of his horses of course - but with horns this time, so it's an easy win for him. Amazing how even he has become commodified by the wonders of the business world.

I've picked out some of the main features of the proposed development below and you can see the rest here but just look at this list:

buildings will have a 'Very Good' BREEAM rating, cleverly avoiding committing to the 'Excellent' rating
carpet tiles - amazing!
male and female toilets - that's one box ticked for the inclusiveness agenda
tea preparation areas on each floor - a thoughtful touch indicating that women will indeed be employed there

Of course this development was approved before a planning application was submitted as we expect nowadays. The area is no stranger to classy upmarket developments so there's plenty of precedent as we expert planners say. I haven't written about the fabulous Lomond Shores yet or the other well known retail outlets in the area but this part of Scotland is literally studded with different ways to shop and do business. A veritable dynamo of the Scottish economy.

Two final points. The word Lomondgate suggests there is something wrong - think Watergate and many others, so not a great choice guys. Also, I make the comparison with Lake Como because of the timeless beauty of that area and the fact that it has historically contained much development. So the people who live in Loch Lomond needn't feel that they are being raped by enterprise or that the character of this well known beauty spot will change. After all, the Italian Fascist Party choose to have one of their headquarters buildings on the shores of Lake Como in the 1930s and people still travel from far and wide to see that today. No comparison intended with the Lomondgate Business Park of course.

The Royal Wedding and Planning

2010-11-17T21:50:00.008Z

You know, I can't abide the fuss that's being made about the scrubber Kate Middleton and the inbred royal halfwit Prince William getting married next year. Apparently David Cameron was banging the table in sheer molten joy at the news and that says it all - thank you Julie Christie for that one. Of course it is a Tory wedding for Tory times, likely to be the main event in England next year, celebrated by street parties of inebriates across the land, banging their colonial drums and wishing that their stupid country was great again.

So why am I mentioning this? What can an expert planner like me have to say about this that is relevant to our dynamic world of Scottish property development? Well, it's a conservationist's dream event - just look what happened in the 1980s after the the Charles and Di show. Wall to wall historicism, half-timber and red brick - yes, you've all forgotten that - so red alert! The backcloth to that royal wedding was the everyday grim environment of brick terraces and houses with bits of wood stuck on that became a wash of English suburbia which we still see lapping on the shores of Cumbernauld and Inverness. The Persimmons, Barretts and Wimpeys of this world knew exactly what to do - build more of it - everywhere. Now I'm not opposed to a bit of development as you know - in fact I'm highly partial to it - but the likely outcome of this in Scotland is more half-timbered Highland Housing Expo junk - but all over the place.

But wait - there's more! St Andrews is a place that is tainted by royalty. William met her there didn't he? It's actually like a wee bit of England sitting like a bunion on the coast of our fair land - like Milltimber or Eaglesham, but more royal. I know St Andrews well and I'm always appalled by its horrible tweedie tidiness and its tearooms for old women. So they must takes some of the blame for the conservation wash - and maybe for New Urbanism too!

So anyway, I'm ranting on now. Good luck then to the enlarged Munsters, the Addams family or whatever you want to call them. And to the rest of us, look out for a conservation revival soon. In particular, the rise again of the Royal Wedding House.

The role of women in planning

2010-11-16T22:16:00.007Z

You know, I meant to write a few weeks ago about the deep poison in our professional planning world that is public consultation and the needless interference of busy-bodies - usually women - who obstruct our activities. I suppose it is a natural thing for women to interfere with men - as natural as doing the dishes or dusting the mantelpiece, sweeping the front path, making the bed or ironing their man's shirt. If they have a man that is.

It was the last issue of the Scottish Planner that really annoyed me but so much has happened in the last couple of weeks that I couldn't get round to writing this post. Everywhere in that issue, women with short hair are spouting about community engagement, mentoring, youth coaching and other namby-pamby activities which are almost entirely irrelevant in today's business-driven world of property-led planning and development. It's a clear case of trying to ring-fence an area of activity and calling it their own because they are so useless at the real meat of planning - enabling development by rich people.

The President of the RTPI is a women I think - but maybe that was last year - or even next year. Who cares? Even the President of the RIBA is a women - I saw her on the TV giving an award to Polish architect Zaza Hadid at the Stirling Awards which I commented on before. Some might say it's a conspiracy but I'm broad minded enough to think that there should be a role or two for women in planning - it's only fair. For example, receptionist duties or typing are both worthwhile areas of employment as is making the tea for meetings. Better still, all of these job areas can be found in the public and private sectors - the world of planning is so broad and inclusive isn't it?

I have a day off tomorrow. I'm waiting on a delivery of more logs for the fire and I will enjoy chopping them up at the weekend - I will think about the Scottish Planner as I am wielding my axe. It's my turn to get the boy for the weekend so I'm looking forward to that - even if he isn't - and I have some plans to take him to see some astonishing new developments. Stay tuned!

Smart Successful Scotland!

2010-11-12T14:55:00.006Z

You know, I am guilty of concentrating on success stories on this blog - the work of Dr Donald Trump, the imperious Sir Ian Wood and lately, the brave Sir David Murray and his 1690 Village near Edinburgh called the Garden District. These will be the crown jewels of a smart successful Scotland - a risk taking culture shifting environment filled with generators of intensified economic activity, like Halfords, TK Maxx and of course B&Q - those elder statesmen of the retail park.

But what of the destitute towns of Central Scotland such as Kilsyth, Shotts and Bridge of Weir? What of the pauper villages of Aberdeenshire and the north east like Kemnay or Mintlaw where you can hardly hear yourself speak above the rattle of beggars' tin mugs?

Well, as we expert planners all know, the answer is through the trickle down of wealth from these three very rich people. Some guy in Mintlaw can do the plumbing in one of Trump's lavatories at Menie Estate - problem solved! Someone else can cut down the trees in Union Terrace Gardens for Sir Ian - that's more money in the local economy! There is even a job for a wee guy from Kilsyth hanging up the Union Jacks in Sir David's Garden District! Fantastic yes? So regenerating Scotland isn't rocket science now is it?

But when I think of the goons in London, the Royal Town Planning Institute, playing at their elections, it's hard to see some connection between them and the dynamic world of Scottish regeneration. Junior Vice President Colin Haystack and his band of place-men exhorting RTPI members to vote for who will be President in 2012. Humph - it's enough to give you the dry boak! Perhaps these guys would recommend a nice wee building facelift? Perhaps a new bench or a special tree in a public space? A bit of public art as a nice wee feature? Maybe give something planning permission? Turn the country around with a few advertisement hoardings? All these things come from the bumper fun book of planning ideas but for Scotland, they are irrelevant in the face of self-sustaining trickle down economic growth which will enliven our communities and bring riches beyond measure.

By the way, I tore up my ballot paper despite the chance to win a £5.00 book token for returning my vote. I will either resign from the Institute soon or stand for election to the Scottish Branch.

The Orange Tide hits Edinburgh!

2010-11-07T11:13:00.020Z

You know, it isn't really surprising that Sir David Murray, owner of The Huns, the Sons of William and Govan's Finest, the Teddy Bears - otherwise known as Glasgow Rangers Football Club - is so keen to obliterate green belt on the west side of Edinburgh. Think about it in terms of Central Scotland sectarianism for a moment - Celtic and Hibernian FCs will have no answer to this. It isn't a coincidence that the roofs of his new development called Edinburgh's Garden District will be orange pantiles throughout. Connect these facts with the likelihood that the Purple Hun, Heart of Midlothian Football Club, may well be playing in a fantastic new stadium in the middle of the new housing scheme and you have a development which is the match of any in Scotland at the moment - with significant prominent exceptions of course.

Let's go back and look at this through my expert planners eyes. I noticed in the Press and Journal this week that people have been getting their knickers in a twist about this brave new development so what is it exactly? Well it's a vast new extension to Edinburgh that dwarfs other proposals around the city - mixed use of course. The main feature of this is a boulevard centrepiece designed for all sorts of ceremonial marching events but especially Orange Parades. Built on derelict green belt, the proposal will revitalise the whole of Edinburgh. All the right boxes have been ticked - sustainability, transport, lifestyle and economics - all wrapped up in a charette process. It's an amazing idea put together by the Reverend Andrew Duany who does most of the planning for big business in Scotland these days! Andy knows how to oil the wheels of industry!

Now some might say that this proposal has no legs. But wait! Sir David has the endorsement of Scotland's Chief Planner, Wee Jimmy Mackinnon - already! It's a fantastic coo and sums up what I have been saying over the past few weeks - the need for planning permission is becoming increasingly redundant as all major developments are effectively being approved before planning applications are submitted. Look at the Great Dr Donald Trump saga at Menie or Union Terrace Gardens in Aberdeen - the epicentre of dynamic growth in Scotland, if not Europe.

It's a trend that knocks the conservationers for six and ushers in a whole New Enlightenment for Scotland in which the sandal-wearing lefty hippies are ground down and used as fertiliser. In the case of Edinburgh Garden District, Greenwash is replaced by Orangewash tricked out in red white and blue as Masonic Temples, homes for retired policemen, retreats for homosexual football referees and Orange Lodges punctuate the residential and retail plots with Union Jacks flying from every lamp post.

At the end of the day, kites may have been flown, but people with money and power will always know what is best and how to get it. It's obvious that Wee Jimmy Mackinnon is a powerful man anyway but it seems he is also a lifelong Rangers man - not that this has in any way swayed his judgement. So there you have it - full marks to everyone involved in another fantastic Scottish development stamped all over with excellence. Personally I can't wait to see it happen.

Banzai on the waterfront!

2010-11-06T13:06:00.008Z

You know, everyone in Dundee will soon be speaking a few more words of Japanese than they do at the moment. In a few years time the five Japanese words known throughout Dundee - Banzai, Sushi and Tora! Tora! Tora! - will be supplemented by U~ōtāfuronto ni howaitoerefanto, or White Elephant on the Waterfront.

The announcement this week that Kengo Kuma and Associates will build the English Museum known as V&A as the centrepiece of the otherwise derelict waterfront project is a devastating body blow for the elite forces of the Scottish architectural fraternity. Sutherland Fussey, RMJM, Gareth Hopkins and others have seen their projects kicked into the Silvery Tay by the judges. Even my own favourite, the proposal by Snøhetta, which could have continued life as an Asda Superstore after it failed to attract any visitors, has been rejected!

Well, I'm reminded of the old Japanese proverb "Ti no naka no kawazu taikai wo shirazu" or "the frog in the well doesn't know the sea". The judges of this competition are certainly the frogs in the well. To live in a thermos flask, isolated from the realities of property development is a major flaw and shows a complete lack of understanding of the forces at work in Scotland today. Everywhere we look, retailers and housebuilders are getting planning permission to build anywhere - no one will say no! Fantastic! So why bother with an English Museum when Dundee could have more shops? As I've said many times before, what will attract more people? A Superstore or a Museum - it's obvious isn't it? The loons in Brechin and Forfar won't be travelling down to see the English Museum - they will be too busy getting high in Council estates and dunking their bridies in their beer for that. But they would go to a spanking new shopping development.

So too much gazing into the darkness of the well has brought Dundee to this sorry state of affairs. A quote from Emperor Hirohito is appropriate, “We have resolved to endure the unendurable and suffer what is insufferable.” That's what the good folks of Dundee have been saying for years and this proposal won't change it. Maybe a wee trip up to Aberdeen for those in charge would help - they certainly know how to do development with style and panache!

Chop! Chop!

2010-11-01T19:24:00.007Z

Impressive photie isn't it? Yesterday, and the Sunday before, I spent the day chopping wood for the fire. I was reminded by a friend on Facebook that wood warms us three times - when we chop it, when we stack it and when we burn it. I would like to add a fourth. When we burn someone at the stake with it.

Out in the garden amidst the advancing autumnal colours, every log had someone's face on it. So when my axe fell, those who had tried to derail my career over the years were dispatched to oblivion. Very therapeutic. Those women at the public meetings with their smug husbands wearing baseball caps. The people who once wrote graffiti on my desk or in the executive toilet at the office. The consultants who treated me like a lower form of life - even though I desperately want to be like them. They were now firewood.

Anyway I was angrily chopping away when I began to realise how good I felt. I felt purged and clean - but I needed more! Slowly a strategy began to develop - as an expert planner, this was easy. I looked at the potato patch. It had done its work for this year - six potatoes at the most and not a great success - but the recently turned over soil reminded me of something I read in a book.

I waited in the kitchen for darkness to fall, then waited for another hour. It was a clear moonlit night - then the time was right. I stripped naked and ran into the garden, throwing myself onto the earth of the potato patch. I lay on my back looking at the stars with my hands digging into the soft earth. I did some forward somersaults. I lay on my front writhing around, grasping at the soil and pressing myself into it. I almost lost my glasses. I felt a sense of déjà view - it was like visiting the landscaping at Ferry Village near Renfrew all over again where I was transfixed by the work of those Goliaths of Scottish design - Ian White Associates. Bleak and unsettling, tactile and spellbinding.

When it was all over I needed a bath of course then settled down to watch Desperate Housewives - the less said about them the better. All in all a great day and a grand primer for some great planning this week.

A nice wee feature

2010-10-30T16:12:00.013+01:00

You know, I occasionally like to share some of my wide ranging planning expertise here so that I can enlighten folk who are less knowledgeable than I am so I'm going to fill you in about public art and its uses in the exciting world of town planning. Most commonly, it's what we call "a nice wee feature", often used at a "gateway" to a regeneration area or even as the centrepiece of a business park or shopping centre. Often it can be used to indicate where you might find a public toilet. Useful. That wooden frog above is a sure sign that something has happened in the area - large wooden frogs don't just appear by the roadside overnight in my experience.

Animals are very popular and one of my favourites is this lovely wee metal dog and his master from somewhere down south. Truly a triumphant work and a very meaningful piece too that resonates with the times - a boy and his dog go shopping - how very apt. So full marks and a big tick for the genius that dreamt up this one.

Now it's true that this sort of thing has been around for a while dating back to Roman times perhaps - or at least to when the Romans were driven out of Scotland by the Picts in 1066 - for example above (courtesy of Google Streetview) you can see a piece of public art over 1000 years old that commemorates that very event on the Antonine Wall near Cumbernauld. Excuse me if my grasp of history is a little sketchy here but you get the idea. This is a great wee feature if ever there was one - clever of the Romans.

But perhaps my all time favourite is this composition above - nothing whatsoever to do with the lovely young lady on the left I assure you - but a really attractive feature. Like a fireplace - but without the fire.

So you can see, public art is not only a force for good but also an excellent way of showing that town planners have been hard at work in an area. Sooner than you can say "women with blazing chip pans", public art tells you that you are in a depraved community that has placed its first foot on the ladder of progress - thanks to town planning.

Life is precious

2010-10-23T19:36:00.013+01:00

You know, a year ago at this time I was posting almost every day about the amazing developments I had found across the length and breadth of Scotland - literally from Gretna Green to John o' Groats. I was consumed by it. I remember the frisson of running my fingers over the cladding of Tesco at Port Glasgow - austere and elemental, impeccably detailed. I was enraptured with wonder - my mouth was dry. I remember the shiver down my spine as I passed by the frozen food section. The human touch of the friendly pigeons flying around inside.

It was living proof that town planning is one of the most satisfying of the professions and it's role in enabling development is crucial to the economy of the country - and England too. At the same time, the unnecessary and uncalled for abuse that I received for my support of Donald Trump and Sir Ian Wood was cruel and hurtful, so much so that I shut down the blog for a spell.

As you all know, I have lived alone since my beautiful wife left me for her young lover, taking my son, who now calls me Grandad, to live a few miles away. I never see her - she drops off the boy with a mutual friend once a fortnight and I have to pick him up. Usually we go for a drive to a retail park - we are both happy there - for a while. She makes me feel like a leper.

But as I sit beside this electric fire with winter's icy fingers clawing at my wee house, I can't help feeling that depression is beginning to grip me again. I think of our public meetings filled with overweight, hectoring, middle class, interfering women wearing brightly coloured cardigans - and I want to attack them with my axe. Yes I do.

The bowling club closed for winter three weeks ago so I'm at a loose end but tomorrow I will use the axe to chop some wood for the fire and I will enjoy the physical activity and the violence of it all. Life is precious isn't it?

Another triumph for the UK development industry

2010-10-23T14:34:00.018+01:00

I'm sure my regular readers were all agog this week at the stimulating news from across the border of dramatic cuts in public spending by the Tories. Particularly relevant to the exciting world of town planning was the news that CABE (The Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment) was to be flushed down the toilet of common sense. This is a major boost for the nation's development industry as CABE notoriously tried to block some very fine projects and of course architects resented their interference in the design process too. So architects and developers can now do what they want - which is fantastic news isn't it?

For those working in CABE, the key words here are 'package', 'early retirement' and 'consultancy'. I've said many times before that every change in government policy conceals a human tragedy of some kind - but also an opportunity. So as the memory of CABE rots on the compost heap, let's see what this might mean for Scotland when the axe is swung next year. What sort of message has it sent to Wee Fat Alex Salmond, a man who likes to oil the wheels of industry?

First of all, Architecture and Design Scotland (A+DS) may be binned - it is the equivalent of CABE with a similar reputation for stopping things happening in the dynamic world of Scottish property development. So while there may be no more Bakewell Tarts in Bakehouse Close there will be many more fine developments throughout Scotland like Glasgow Harbour, the Tesco at Port Glasgow and of course like the amazing developments of that dynamic duo in Aberdeenshire - Sir Ian and Dr Donald! This is a certainty - property folk are just waiting to be set free and the demise of A+DS would be a gigantic first step. So when the bonfire of the kangaroos comes to Scotland they could be the first to go.

A final point. The huge opportunity for the development industry created by the disappearance of A+DS will only be maximised if planning departments disappear too. As I've suggested in recent posts, the heavy weight of bureaucracy pressing down on our marvellous development industry is a big negative for Scotland. So let's have some clear radical thinking next time round and bin the planning departments!

Scotland on Sunday is Trump's enemy

2010-10-17T21:25:00.011+01:00

You know, I'm finding it very hard to hold myself back from driving down to Edinburgh and giving Eddie Barnes of Scotland on Sunday a piece of my mind. If I didn't have some important meetings this week, that's exactly what I would do. The newspaper has broken cover with a complete non-story, published in a deliberate attempt to smear Dr Donald Trump and the Scottish Government. The suggestion is that the Scottish Government promised Trump that his development would go ahead - before the public inquiry. Well of course they promised that! Moreover it has been placed in the newspaper by the Labour Party and by conservationists. It is nonsense from beginning to end and here's why:

It is the responsibility of government to act in the best interests of the country - Wee Fat Alex Salmond called in the planning application on the grounds that "the decision put the integrity of the planning process in jeopardy". How true that is! You just can't argue with that!
Wee Fat Alex Salmond told Trump, "You will win". Well of course he would win - everyone knew that so it didn't need a crystal ball to see that the government was going to support the development at all costs. It's called 'enabling' in our expert planner parlance.
I was personally invited to an event at Holyrood at which I heard the First Prime Minister say that he had to 'make something happen' with the Trump development. Of course. It is the responsibility of government to do this rather than stand in the sidelines while there is endless bickering between a Council and a bunch of beggars and conservationists who wear sandals and live in railway carriages in the woods.

I've been critical of this government in the past but I realise now that they have the best interests of the development industry at heart and recognise a world-beating proposal when they see one. This is why noteworthy projects like Glasgow Harbour, Edinburgh Waterfront and Inverurie Retail Park have all gone ahead despite many objections from the great unwashed. Even the McDonalds in my home town of Lenzie is aspirational in terms of environmental design - and food! All these developments have set new standards of excellence which are a model for us all to follow.

So this is a total non-story, placed in an unsuspecting press by a bunch of bitter and twister conservationists. Please bear that in mind when you are reading it.

Another nail in the coffin for planning

2010-10-16T16:31:00.010+01:00

You know, the Scottish section of Planning really is on the ball these days with a cutting edge article this week about permitted development rights. I find this very surprising considering it is written by the idiots in the RTPI - but more about them later. Run-of-the-mill people can't access this virtual treasure trove of information but I'm always delighted to bring you a little titbit to brighten up your day.

Well, as I've hinted in recent posts, the planning system is 'circling the drain' as doctors say of those about to pass on. The latest news from Wee Fat Alex Salmond's people is that permitted developments could be cut next year - apparently 97% of householder applications are approved anyway so why bother with the remaining 3%? Exactly - a big tick and a gold star there.

So maybe 4,000 applications will be taken out of the system cutting out the need for many development control planners who will find themselves quite rightly on the dole. Yes - behind every major success story there is human tragedy - but this is precisely the kick in the backside that planners need! Too often they are found in the toilets of Council offices reading the Sun or the Daily Record. It's about time they were given proper work to do - like planning the future instead of stopping people building barbeques - catalysing property development instead of cheating at sudoku - really the sky is the limit. But they can't all be brilliant visionaries - like me! So many will face a bleak future once the gravy train of processing planning applications oozes to a brown halt at the buffers of progress.

The RTPI has to have a serious look at how they have accelerated the collapse of the planning system. They need to create people who can work with the likes of Dr Donald Trump or Sir Ian Wood to enable them to move their visions forward - to grease the developers pole rather than produce fodder for dole queues. Mark my words - there will come a time very soon when planning applications themselves will be taken out of the system. And then it will be Local Development Plans for the chop. Then what? So wake up you goons in London and get working on a new generation of planner - before it is too late!

Glasgow Airport's Rail Link will be sold off

2010-10-12T01:24:00.007+01:00

You know, I had to laugh the other day when I came across Wendy Alexander crying into her broken mirror (the one she broke by looking into it) about the decision to sell off the land that would have accommodated GARL - the Glasgow Airport Rail Link - just because it would have been in her constituency - had it ever been built.

Now as an expert planner, I know a fair bit about infrastructure as well as human nature and believe me, there was never the faintest chance of people using this rail link - except for guys on the Buckfast who were too drunk to get on the right train from Glasgow Central. Two good reasons why it would never work:

firstly business people don't want to sit in a stinking old diesel train. It would be absurd for our generals of industry to be seen on the maroon and cream train that marks people out as plebs and chavs. Right?
second reason - nobody in business wants to fly from Glasgow Airport as it is a second rate shopping mall filled with drunken halfwits flying off to Benidorm and Torremolinos for a fortnight of burds and bevvy (not my words of course). Big business, especially the upper echelons of property development don't want to be associated with this sort of thing. For example you wouldn't find Dr Donald Trump or Sir Ian Wood on the train to Glasgow Airport - would you?

So I hate to say it but wee fat Alex Salmond was right to cancel this daft project. Selling off the land to enable new development in the area - even if it is long and thin - is the right answer, so full marks and a big tick to the guys who thought this one up. I also look forward to plans for a wider motorway being announced in the near future - now that is the way to travel to the airport!

The Dr Donald and Sir Ian Show

2010-10-10T10:00:00.007+01:00

You know, I struggled all day on Friday to attend the event that put the Stirling Prize into perspective for me. First of all the car wouldn't start then I got a puncture at Inverurie so I arrived after my heroes had gone. I was devastated as you can imagine. Anyway, Donald Trump was awarded a well deserved Doctorate by Robert Gordon University but guess who presented it to him? Yes - Sir Ian Wood!

When I saw the picture of them (above) together in the Press and Journal I realised the sheer spurting dynamic chemistry between them. There's a raw drive and vision in both men to get things done despite the odds - the atmosphere at the ceremony must have been truly electrifying!

Both men used the opportunity to remind locals that if their respective developments did not go ahead, Aberdeenshire would become a desert filled with beggars and old people desperately searching through litter bins for their breakfast while sheep grazed in Union Terrace Gardens. This is of course only partly true - yes the north east would become a desert but really everybody knows that these developments are going ahead anyway. There is no risk of failure.

As the Editor of the P&J says, the silent majority must stand up and the vocal minority must sit down. And as I've said before, people with knighthoods, doctorates, power and money know best - the rest should be happy to follow them. Fantastic - yes this is one in the eye for the proles and all in all, a very clever bit of action by Robert Gordon's Chancellor to ratchet up the game a little more in Aberdeenshire! More power to them!

It's Ravenscraig Town Centre - again!

2010-10-09T20:03:00.013+01:00

You know, when it comes to implementing a development of national importance, you have to pick the right team - guys who can create dazzling designs, folk who can bend the rules, traffic engineers who can invent a good TIA (that's a traffic impact analysis for the uninformed) and most important of all, people who can humiliate the local government planners with speed, creativity and élan.

Well! My personal copy of Planning this week described exactly how this can be done. It's a new plan for Ravenscraig in Motherwell - a derelict area of old steel works that were flattened years ago. Now try to hold yourselves together while I reveal the dynamic team who will do this work:

Project managers - Turner and Townsend: a firm who have some of the sharpest pencils in Scotland
Architects - Cooper Cromar: one of the most blatantly commercial firms around having produced numerous retail and residential schemes over the years - a big tick
Planners - Muir Smith Evans: bible-bashing Christians but brilliant at getting planning permission and winning appeals - their approach is Evangelical!
Engineers - URS Corporation: fresh from eating Scott Wilson but may have indigestion
Traffic - Colin Buchanan: fresh from doing Traffic in Towns - a few years back though
Big Architecture - Keppie Design: the most important element in the package of course with armpits full of talent!

There are other folk involved who are expert box tickers like Grontmij, DSSR, Gleeds and Heritage Environmental who will be excellent at enabling and form filling - don't laugh but this is a critical part of the job these days. Personally I can't wait to see what they come up with! All in all, this is one of the most impressive teams ever assembled in Scotland - if not the world.

Now a word of caution - proposals for Ravenscraig have been around for years and in fact there are new proposals for the site almost every year. This is something that Scottish Enterprise insist on - it's a sort of testing to destruction of all the options. You know the sort of thing - well this hasn't worked so we will try some other people - okay so that didn't work either - so let's try someone else. Been there - done that when I worked with people like Bill Morton and Stuart Gulliver in Bothwell Street all those years ago.

Everyone knows that the biodiversity angle is important these days so the orchids, badgers, wildflowers and insect species have had their boxes ticked already - great isn't it? Also public art gets a big tick too of course with the obligatory involvement of young creative people in the process. This is all too good to be true. Well it isn't actually true - it's just a fictional composition of the sort of bits and pieces that make up a good planning application these days.

So 10/10 from me with a gold star and a big tick in my notebook. It is truly the power and the glory of town planning. This must be one of the finest projects around at the moment and I'll try to keep you up to date on its progress. What an exciting world we live in!

The Stirling Prize is for Poseurs!

2010-10-09T16:21:00.008+01:00

You know, it's a week to the day since I sat here with the ferrets watching the Stirling Prize on the TV - it still rankles with me, partly as I could have been watching Strictly, but especially because I realised I was wasting my time tuning in to luvvies, pseuds and poseurs having a great evening together. Remember back in August last year I wrote this post about the Lighthouse in Glasgow and how I wouldn't miss it? Well I felt the same way about this programme and all the pretentious people they had dragged out to patronise and humiliate me with their London ways - give me my baseball bat please! Yet again, I felt like a country bumpkin despite my tremendous record of building and my extensive knowledge of architecture and town planning.

So this is really an award for those and those isn't it? No Keppies, no 3DReid and even RMJM were unrepresented - outrageous! Avant-guard firms like Bracewell Stirling and the Holmes Partnership didn't get a mention and neither did Glasgow Harbour, the Asda at Ardrossan or the Halfords at Inverurie. No Scottish representation at all - and this is the Stirling Prize. Something is wrong somewhere. And when it came to the moment when the winner was announced, well, I couldn't have cared less.

I shouldn't say it but I hated all these folk - the presenter from Grand Designs with his ears pushed forward by all that studio technology hiding behind them or the wee guy Tom with the big words who was all dressed up - many times. I'll tell you, I wouldn't like to meet him on a dark night on the moors - well to be fair, he wouldn't want to meet me either I'm sure. Sorry to be so grumpy.

But every cloud has a silver lining and I've fallen for the lovely Amanda Levete who appeared briefly on the programme. Now there is a worthy prize winner! I wonder if she has any reason to be in Scotland soon - probably not.

A cathedral to business at Peterhead

2010-10-07T23:53:00.009+01:00

You know, when I say that Aberdeenshire is the new epicentre of dynamic growth in Scotland (if not in Europe) I mean what I say. When I read my Press and Journal this morning I was doubly thrilled - so much so that I forgot to feed the ferrets before I left for work. My mind was literally buzzing with the sheer business acumen and bravado of folk across in the north east. But wait - things get better! One of my all time favourite design firms is responsible for this project - a massive business and technology park on the edge of Peterhead designed by Keppies! Amazing!

Now this is a mind boggling project - a 300 acre site providing over 1,400 jobs in over 5.4 million square feet of business, storage and industrial units. It's called the Energetica Industry Park - amazing! The project has been shown to an adoring public and a planning application will be submitted in November. This is planning-speak for letting the public know that planning permission has already been granted. Believe me, it's a sort of nudge-nudge wink-wink thing that we planning experts do. You see, the goons in the RTPI know that the game is a bogey and that you can't stop the wheels of industry - only domestic extensions and some hot food shops get refused these days. So Keppies will get the green light - that is guaranteed.

Now I don't have any wee photies of the actual proposal so I put these together by imagining what it will be like - a veritable cathedral to business, glistening in the sunlight, reflecting in the North Sea and visible for miles around. Now you can guess what they will be making there - yes, golf balls for Dr Donald Trump's world-beating golf course just down the road to name but a few. It's what we expert planners call a cluster of excellence and you can also imagine factories being established to produce flags for the greens, sports bags and plastic seagulls. Really, the sky is the limit.

So congratulations to Keppies for another world beating design initiative. It's a fantastic boost for an area that is already doing better than the rest of Scotland put together. The march of development over the countryside continues apace and soon, Aberdeen and Peterhead will link up in an ark of prosperity the likes of which has never been seen before, casting hundreds of agricultural workers off the land and into proper employment, leaving the sheep to run for the hills. For Peterhead, the future is assured.

Woolly thinking in Dundee

2010-10-01T20:15:00.007+01:00

You know, when I receive my personal copy of Planning every week from the RTPI goons in London, I always go straight to the Scottish news. There is some good news this week for Dundee as the Court of Session has dismissed a bid by Tesco to block plans for a new Asda store on the former NCR site at Wester Gourdie. That's great news for Dundee and for Asda - sales of the best Lorne Sausage that money can buy will continue and the good people of Dundee will have the choice they deserve. However in my expert planning view there is a very large fly in the ointment - some might say a big bluebottle.

The English museum commonly known as the V&A or Victoria and Albert is to build a satellite on the banks of the River Tay and it has been the subject of an international architectural competition, the shortlist of which was also announced this week. But what a load of rubbish - no Keppies and no Halliday Fraser Munro though I believe that the Great Dr Donald Trump's manservant architect Gareth Hopkins is playing a minor role in one of the teams. Here's another joke building, this time by Rex - I had a dog called Rex when I was a boy.

Anyway, the point is that this is all wrong. Asda should locate on the waterfront and adopt one of the shortlisted proposals - yes? So what would attract more people and spending? A big Asda or an English Museum? The answer is clear and my proposal is shown below - I got wee Robbie, the technician in the office, to knock this one up for me. It's a proposal by a firm called Snøhetta - first their proposal then my brilliant suggestion underneath!

Fantastic! I know that Royalist Director of Planning Mike Galloway OBE will immediately see the error of his ways and go down the common sense route of retail rather than a dull old English Museum. That's the power of town planning!

David Kennedy is an idiot

2010-09-29T19:44:00.003+01:00

I was completely astounded when I saw the front page of the Press and Journal this morning - I was going to write a blog post from work but decided to calm down and wait to see how I felt when I got home this evening. BUT I AM STILL BOILING OVER WITH ANGER!!! The man you see above is David Kennedy who was the first principal of Robert Gordon 'University'. He is a complete idiot - he didn't have a degree so he gave himself an Honorary one but now he is handing it back because, he says, he is “appalled” by plans to acknowledge the multi-billionaire businessman Dr Donald Trump by giving him a well deserved Honorary Degree and accused Robert Gordon of making the gesture to try to secure large donations.

Well let me put you straight old man. The Great Dr Donald Trump has revolutionised business practices and prospects in the north east by humiliating the planners, by building a golf course on some old sand dunes and constructing virtually a new town full of hotels, bars, executive housing and retail outlets which are the envy of the UK if not the World. You will not find one person who objects to this magnificent development - apart from some well known interference from a local scrapyard and from a few inbred local numpties.

So while Donald has actually achieved something very unique and special, you David Kennedy have done nothing with your life. Even the frogs and newts of Menie will be happy while you are crying into the empty envelope that once contained your Honorary Degree. Enjoy your moment of fame loser - because that's all you will get. And it's more than you deserve.

The vocabulary of town planning

2010-09-25T13:27:00.010+01:00

You know, I was genuinely delighted earlier this week to give a talk to the local Scottish Women's Rural Institute (SWRI) about the great work I do at Auchterness. Unfortunately my enjoyment of the event was tarnished by a great deal of heckling and the submission of a petition asking for my resignation from the post of Secretary.

Anyway, the important message I put across was that town planning is a tremendously exciting profession and if you speak the right language, like me, you can really go places. Singing from the same hymn sheet, grass roots aspirations, low hanging fruit and signing up to consensus are all part of our daily vocabulary here at Auchterness - we know what we mean, even if others don't. So we can build an intellectual mystic around ourselves and our work. Great isn't it?

I told the SWRI that, "We are sustainable, inclusive, holistic and consultative - and we are always moving forward. We reaffirm local structures depending on the intervention need, creating a mandate for pursuing a particular process targeted at different age groups - and pressing the issue in relation to sub-strategies". I sensed that the audience was reeling at this point so I pushed home my case. "We have a portcullis approach to the issues of tourism with one plan sitting beneath another and kicking off relations with a three year action plan but without a perfect route to dividends. We will have a healthy living centre with a raft of other initiatives and the important messages are social, environmental, economic and janatorial".

At this point I sensed that the audience was in need of practical examples so I settled into a resume about Dr Donald Trump, Sir Ian Woods and Clydeport PLC - the creator of Glasgow Harbour and the inspiration for Leith Waterfront. As the audience began to leave, I realised that the fish and chip shop was about to close in ten minutes so I did a quick wrap up.

All in all, an excellent evening and a great opportunity for local people to connect to the exciting world of Town Planning.

Robert Gordon's know how to crawl!

2010-09-20T00:55:00.006+01:00

You know, I find it hard to say the words 'Robert Gordon University' - I will always associate Robert Gordon's of Aberdeen with the Plumbers College they really are. I also appreciate that they are a private school responsible for producing a nasty strain of public schoolboy that is well out of place in the fishwife dominated environment of Greater Torry.

Of course the guys who run Robert Gordon's are not stupid - even though most of the students are - and I was thrilled to read the other day that they will award my all time hero Donald Trump with an honorary Doctor of Business Administration on the 8th of October. That's no doubt a date for most of your diaries. Dr Trump will deliver an acceptance address in front of an audience of invited guests and students and I for one will be hanging on every word. The 'University' has chosen to confer this degree on Donald in recognition of his business acumen, entrepreneurial vision and the long-term future his company is planning in the North-East of Scotland. Isn't that fantastic?

So you see, flattening the sand dunes, crushing the newts and toads and ignoring the planners actually works. All praise to Dr Donald for establishing a new business ethic in the north east of Scotland, revolutionising planning and ploughing the scrapyards and small holdings into the eighteenth hole. This is the way it should be!

Scott Wilson devoured - who cares?

2010-09-17T21:00:00.012+01:00

You know, I've been pondering this week over the disappearance of famous engineering consultants Scott Wilson who were swallowed up by American giant URS, who previously gorged themselves on Thorburn Colquhoun and many others. Of course Scott Wilson weren't just engineers - they were a truly multidisciplinary company with a reputation for being mediocre at all sorts of things ranging from project management and transportation to landscaping gardens and most importantly, town planning. A cross between a Goliath and a dinosaur.

Now we all know that when a snake has a meal it sleeps afterwards. Scott Wilson spent much of their time feasting on other companies, making irresistible offers to folk who were close to retirement, scunnered with their hopeless staff and unable to sack them because of employment laws. They should have been getting on with the work instead of empire building - getting work for themselves instead of buying other firms' clients! Well Scott Wilson fell asleep and now they have paid the ultimate penalty for their greed and that was careless. Now they've gone - how cares? Well I do.

I'm old enough now to remember a very different consultant picture in Scotland - names like Crouch and Hogg (famous for the elegant Kessock Bridge - above), Babtie Shaw and Morton or even William Gillespie and Partners, Brian Clouston and many others who I can't recall but who all worked with me at the Scottish Development Agency.

But wait! It's entirely possible that some of my current day heroes will also disappear. Folk like Archial and 3DReid, those masters of commercial design, would provide a great meal for an ambitious company. Halliday Fraser Munro - those victorious heroes who will be infilling Union Terrace Gardens in Aberdeen - may also find themselves digesting in the stomach of a larger predator though the sheer talent in HFM could prove to be a very rich dish. But ultimately this would be bad for Scotland - I could stomach the loss of some of these companies but one thing is for sure - Keppie Design will never surrender to a snake in the grass.

They are too big and too talented to let that happen and with their heritage stretching all the way back to the nineteenth century, working for toffs and building most of Glasgow, they will surely lead our country through this century as a design leader and inspiration to all of us.

PS I've just noticed in my personal copy of Planning that the goons in the RTPI are mightily upset because Scott Wilson were their Consultant of the Year in 2009. Well what a shame but it goes with the territory - EDAW were winners in 2001 then eaten by AECOM a few years later. So if you want to remain alive, don't have anything to do with the RTPI!

It's all go for tower blocks around Aberdeen!

2010-09-04T12:41:00.008+01:00

You know, I almost choked on my Rice Krispies this morning as I read my personal edition of Planning. The fantastic news is that Aberdeen City Council have announced plans for more than 20,000 new homes to be built over the next few years, focusing on Aberdeen Football Club's amazing new space age stadium - somewhere in the green belt. My goodness! The good folk of the Aberdeen property development industry don't even think about limits. Fresh from the success of Union Terrace Gardens they just get on with things. If the rest of the country was like that, Scotland would be a world leader in ploughing up green belt instead of being cosy with frogs and newts. Our First Minister, wee fat Alex Salmond would be thrilled.

Just look at that stadium - the Red Ultras will have a great time there. But wait. Isn't there a huge opportunity here to build these 20,000 homes as tower blocks. A thoroughly modern city grouped around a football stadium is an enticing prospect and matches the visions of the Great Donald Trump and Sir Ian Woods at Menie and Union Terrace Gardens.

This is exactly the sort of development that should have been proposed at Grandhome by the Reverend Andrew Duany instead of the Highland Housing Expo Scottish nonsense that will be happening there - big mistake. Look at this fantastic proposal below - this is the sort of futuristic housing that Aberdeen will build given a fair wind.

This one was done by a firm called FAT who I've never heard of. It's good but I think Keppies, Archial or even 3DReid could do a better job. Anyway we will just have to wait, but everything looks to be in place to make Aberdeen a genuine replacement for Leith as the real epicentre of dynamic property development led growth in Scotland. A gold star and a big tick for all those involved!

Highland Housing Fair is a joke

2010-08-21T11:35:00.012+01:00

You know, life is full of disappointments - some great and some minor. I drove across to the Highland Housing Fair the other day, 'Scotland's Housing Expo', to see what the great and the good had produced as examples of our new nation's great residential architectural skills - complete with the sustainability label of course. Boy was I disappointed! I expected something modern and exciting with a taste of the future - a bit of Dan Dare I suppose. Instead I saw a collection of pokey wee pseudo Scottish sheds - more Brigadoon than even Andy Stewart would like. Honestly, they'll be filming the White Heather Club there in a wee while and digging up Harry Lauder to do a turn.

I know a great deal about Scottish architecture as you know and it was very sad indeed to see that hardly any of my favourite designers had bothered to put pen to paper for this event. There were some bright moments though - the ever excellent Keppies have produced a masterstroke with their lovely three-storey home.

It is indeed a stately home and makes all the other houses look completely ridiculous. It is a pointer to the future while all the other houses are looking to the past of byres, black houses and butt 'n bens. Here's another wee photie of Keppies work just to make the point.

Truly they are one of the greatest design firms around today - famous and accomplished in architecture, masterplanning, landscape and cost cutting. This is work that merits a gold star and a big tick from me.

Also there is a wee building there by a firm I hadn't heard of before called Bracewell Stirling which is modest yet shows great promise. It has the look of a building that was designed some time ago - maybe they pulled it out of a drawer and dusted it down - but this is in fact what most great practices do anyway. So good luck to Bracewell Stirling - your future is bright. And to all the others apart from Keppies - you are hopeless.

PS - I heard this morning that one of the homes has been sold off to a contractor working on the site and that the rest will be sold to local councillors or their relatives at a reduced price. Isn't the Scottish development industry so great.

Union Terrace Gardens are go!

2010-05-19T21:07:00.006+01:00

Well didn't I tell you so? Clever people with money and power have won the day while has-beens like Annie Lennox can go back to their alternative lifestyles or tax havens as appropriate. The great unwashed of Aberdeen and its surrounding bogs and mire can return defeated to their black houses, railway carriage homes and but'n' bens on forsaken hillsides while sensible people celebrate and drink themselves unconscious in the fine bars of Aberdeen tonight. The news is explained here for people who can read.

It's a great day for Aberdeen, for Scotland and for the art and science of town planning - no less than that. You see, when very rich people get involved in regeneration it always ends well - just look at Glasgow Harbour or Edinburgh Waterfront. This time we have seen an alliance of the north east's finest brains like Sir Ian Wood and that lovable rogue of the mass produced housing for the plebs, Stewart Milne who also supports Aberdeen Football Club, one of the most successful teams in the Scottish Premier League this year! It's all just too much. I can scarcely believe how lucky we are to have such fine people involved in planning the future of this great city. And with my hero Donald Trump just up the road, you can see that no other part of Scotland is so blessed.

As for the Peacock Arts Centre, I hope they are out of the game now - thank goodness. Aberdeen has no time for their arty tosh and weird sandal wearing lifestyles. Goodbye losers! That's all I will say for now - I am staying over in Inverness tonight and this wi-fi is costing me a fortune but I will still go out to celebrate the fact that all this was done despite the public. Soon they will appreciate this fabulous and generous initiative. Hurrah for Sir Ian! Hurrah for Stewart Milne!

Building Scotland Magazine is so great!

2010-03-24T20:33:00.017Z

You know, I've raved on about Building Scotland magazine in the past but I'm almost completely overwhelmed by the fantastic collection of developments in my personal edition of this learned journal which I received this morning. Right from the opening pages it's an architect's dream - I gorgeous collection of beautiful projects and people that are worthy of the highest accolades. If you look at the wee photie above you'll see what I mean - cutting edge design delivered with panache and sensitivity to context. It certainly gets a gold star and a big tick from me! No wonder that Scotland is the envy of the architectural world.

Now just look at this building above - it's St Kentigern's Academy at Blackburn in West Lothian. It only cost £6.6m and amazingly, the architects were too humble to put there name to it - but my guess is that Keppies or Archial were responsible for this visual treat. Anyway, I'm sure the lucky children who will be educated in this building will have a great start in life.

Now just look at this! It's a critical road improvement scheme built by Highland Quality Construction and surely an award winning project for it's use of colour, integration with the landscape and sheer craftsmanship - look at the smooth curves of the white-lining! And the delicate use of big black bollards is a lovely touch. Building Scotland really has an eye for these great projects and should be heartily congratulated. This is so great!

Finally I have to mention Andy Walder, Director of the National Construction College, who has two articles in this issue on building a sustainable future. I'm with you there Andy - very important for the planet and our children. Both articles are identical though (page 16 and page 29) and I assume this is a clever editorial technique for emphasising the importance of what this great (if glum) man has to say to Scotland. Sometimes you have to say things twice. So well done Building Scotland Magazine - great work!

Total Luddites

2010-03-15T22:32:00.011Z

Gillespie Investment Group, the Glasgow-based commercial property arm of the Gillespie mining and haulage family firm, has received permission for a £200 million data storage development on a 164-acre part of the Drumshangie site, a former open-cast coal mine at Greengairs. You know, the goons in London - otherwise known as the RTPI - will be getting the message loud and clear at last. There's a fantastic story about it in the Herald today (and I make no apologies for using their image and some of their text). Actually I was personally informed of the situation in North Lanarkshire through a message we received courtesy of Bell and Scott whose daily newsletters about the latest terrific developments in Scotland's rampant property development industry have surveyors and land agents fighting to get to their PCs round about lunchtime every day. Well of course it's not everyone who gets this and to be honest, this was forwarded to me by a friend who works inside the cage at North Lanarkshire Planning Department. Boy are they down in the dumps! Here's why.

One of the most ambitious integrated developments of a former industrial site ever planned in central Scotland has received a key planning permission from North Lanarkshire Council despite opposition from council planners, who were described by local MSP and Scottish Government housing minister Alex Neil, as “total Luddites”. Great - people are speaking the truth for once.

Now I haven't seen details of this great development but I'm sure it is very good - and certainly more than a dump like Greengairs deserves with its open cast coal mines, rubbish tips and slag heaps. Really, the Bucky Bhoys won't even notice. The plans on display behind Cammy Fraser (top picture) look tantalising though and were probably produced by Keppies or some other top firm who know how to get the best out of the planning system and who have always been thought leaders in green belt redevelopment.

But the real story here is how the planners were completely over-ruled by a collection of enlightened elected members who are wise enough to live elsewhere and who poured scorn on all the usual planning issues and went for development at all costs - excellent! Scotland is dragging itself out of the dark ages with the help of Donald Trump and Sir Ian Wood in the Aberdeen area and now help has come from the most unlikely quarter of North Lanarkshire Council. It's great! They should be up for the RTPI's own Planning Award soon!

Edinburgh's slum shops to be phased out

2010-02-21T15:42:00.009Z

You know, I was absolutely delighted to read last week in the Scotsman that local shops in the middle class slums of Edinburgh are about to get a hearty kick up the backside. Yes! At long last Sainsbury's have decided to intervene in this part of the market in a great move that will see horrible wee local shops put to the sword - together with their salmonella sandwiches and mouldy books. So it's goodbye to the small independents, hairdressers and junk shops that make places like Morningside, Marchmont and the Meadows look so old and tatty.

After years of focusing on the construction of fabulous clean out of town superstores that we can all drive to easily, supermarket chains are now looking to local, metro-style stores for their expansion, and in many cases, the independents are alarmed. Well who cares about them? Knocking three or four filthy little shops together into one seems like progress to me. What's more, the food will be properly packaged instead of lying out in a open tray and being home to twenty blue-bottles for the past week. Disgusting!

Here's another great idea - what if Sainsbury's or ideally Asda knocked down a whole parade of local shops, built a metro style store and used the rest of the site for car parking? Now that is a 21st century approach to town planning and the sort of thing that will leave local councils wishing they had thought of it. It's the sort of thing that Scotland's dynamic property development industry will be only too happy to provide and planners will nod it through of course - well they have nothing else to do these days thanks to the goons at the RTPI in London.

The RTPI has a new President!

2010-02-12T18:26:00.010Z

I wonder how many of you town planners out there realise the crisis we have on our hands with the goons in London otherwise known as the Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI). Now as you all know, the RTPI is not my favourite organisation to say the least - flashy offices in London, a ridiculous logo, outrageous fees and company cars for many of the staff.

Now usually the President is a womaniser, religious maniac or sociopath - or all of these. But now they've appointed a woman as President - I carried out an image search for her on Google and the wee photie above is what I found. I don't know President Ann Skippers personally of course but I wish her well and hope that she lives long enough to see out the Presidency. Poor old soul - surely she could find something better to do at her age.

Union Terrace Gardens again

2010-02-08T17:01:00.005Z

I see the Sunday Herald was at it again yesterday, giving publishing space to some local loon called Jim Hamlyn who is opposed to the infilling of the hole currently known as Union Terrace Gardens in Aberdeen. Disgraceful. Why the Sunday Herald is intent on stopping this development is beyond me - they are trying to ruin the city's prospects of regeneration.

Now you all know my views on this - it is perfectly clear that Sir Ian Wood is rich and clever and so will know far more about urban planning than the great unwashed or some crackpot arts association. They will be too busy polishing their sandals to have thought coherently about the merits of these tremendously exciting proposals. Now since I wrote my last piece on this, I've discovered that in addition to the brilliant architectural practice Halliday Fraser Munro whose cutting edge design work has enthralled millions of architectural students across the globe, Sir Ian has also employed Martha Schwarz. I'm led to believe that she is a landscape architect of some kind but honestly I can't imagine why Halliday Fraser need this sort of thing - I mean it's not going to be a park anymore so why bother with a landscape gardener. In Auchterness we've had plenty of experience of these types and believe me, it's a waste of time and money employing them.

So Jim Hamlyn, you can stop crying into your tea up there at Garthdee and face the reality of 21st Century life. Union Terrace Gardens will be no more - buried. Simple as that. A multistorey car park and related developments are worth far more to Aberdeen than a few trees and a chasm where no one goes except drunken wasters and students. Instead look forward to shopping there - you know you will! And as for the Sunday Herald, you should learn from your pointless and failed campaign against the Great Donald Trump and just leave Aberdeen to the rich folk who know better.

Inverness Campus: a retail park in disguise

2010-02-06T14:28:00.014Z

You know, I'm filled with admiration for the work of Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE) as you know. Their recent work in John O' Groats knocked me for six with its retail driven regeneration plan and circular car parks - fantastic! Now, according to my personal weekly edition of Planning (thanks to the goons at the RTPI for this) they've produced another amazing proposal to create an out of town university near Inverness which has gone in for planning permission.

This will be like an enormous retail park for students. That's a big smack in the face for those miserable jimmies who talk about town-and-gown - the silly notion that universities should be in or near town centres because students spend money in shops and cafes and help local businesses by creating a buzzing street life. Well they don't have any money to spend so that's that one put to bed straight away! You just need to look at Stirling University - students just get on the bus for half an hour - so what?

HIE have employed an architectural firm called 7N to create the drawings necessary to get planning permission. I must admit that these are very poor but of course all the fancy stuff will be abandoned later on in the process when the hard facts of life dictate that most of the buildings will be sheds. As it is, 7N's drawings show a depressing environment of little interest or quality. Actually I wonder if they are architects so if they are serious about continuing their involvement, they had better start getting real and forgetting about the infantile stuff. But it is a cunning rouse to get planning permission and should be given large tick because of that.

Now one of the clever things about this campus is that because it is out of town, it will be dead at night so wildlife will be able to use the facilities when the students leave - a clever bit of box-ticking there for the green agenda. Honestly, it's amazing that people are taken in by this trash but they obviously are - and will be again with these garish proposals.

I've known people in HIE for many years - they may not employ the most attractive women in the world and a lot of them are numpties - but they are really at the top of their game when it comes to getting consent for greenfield developments. Congratulations!

Powering up with Forth Ports

2010-01-30T22:27:00.011Z

You know, one of my all time favourite organisations is Forth Ports PLC - well next to Clydeport perhaps. I just love it when a former namby-pamby public body, probably employing thousands upon thousands of wasters and burdens on the state, turns into a rapacious property developer on the back of land assets generously gifted from the public purse. Custodians of the river no more! There's money to be made and beautiful developments to create!

Now you know I had previously mentioned Forth Ports in connection with Leith Docks which I correctly identified as an Epicentre of Dynamic Growth. Well things have been moving on apace since then. Much to the concern of green Wellington-ed nimby conservationists and stoppers-of-good-things-happening Greener Leith, Forth Ports have a devilish plan to build a couple of power stations slap bang in the middle of residential developments on Leith Waterfront. Mixed Use Development at its best! What a proud moment for Edinburgh! Power stations are the cathedrals of the future, enabling our kettles and electric blankets, so having one on your doorstep is just about the best thing ever.

But wait for it....the power station will be fuelled by biomass! Yes - that's one in the eye for the climate police! So the residents of the nearby houses can watch thousands of tons of biomass materials (or trees as they are more commonly known) arriving on trucks day and night. It's a bold move but a necessary realignment with a green agenda which is all some people want to hear about these days.

All power to you Forth Ports - here's to your Batterseas of the future.

I'm back - so is Sir Fred!

2010-01-30T21:43:00.006Z

Hello - I'm back from my spell in the wilderness. My last posts on November 15th hinted at the onset of a depression which is now sadly normal for me in the darkest hours of the miserable Scottish winter. Particularly bad this year as I was snowed in for a week between Christmas and New Year. Just as well I couldn't get out or I might have thrown myself in the loch - except it was frozen over I'm told. Anyway, moving forward into 2010, I hope to ease myself back into a series of long overdue posts dealing with all my favourite subjects and of course some news about our lovely wee Auchterness.

First of all, and I know it's an old story to all you news-hounds out there, I want to welcome back Sir Fred Goodwin to the land of the living - where he belongs. I was horrified at the treatment he received last year from the press and from the criminal fraternity who targeted his modest house in Edinburgh with bricks and dog's doings. Honestly, to think that Scots have so little respect for people with money and power is completely beyond me.

In my long experience as a manager, it has always been the staff who are to blame when things go wrong. Sir Fred Goodwin will be completely blameless for what happened to RBS - mark my words. Personally I blame the tellers and counter staff for this fiasco - and my bank manager too - he must take some of the blame for pulling me up about me going £107.65 overdrawn when his own company was up to its neck in bad debt. Clearly the incompetence and double standards of lower order staff brought this pillar of Scottish finance to its knees. But thankfully, that great Scottish firm RMJM - who I have praised in the past here and here - with its worldwide profile have thrown him a lifeline.

Make no mistake, RMJM have a genuine high flyer here who can step up to the plate and eat as much historic architecture as Leningrad has to offer. Quite rightly, Gazprom are proceeding with the electrifying proposals drawn up by Fred Goodwin and it will soon be obvious to all except the naysayers, conservationists, communists and other dissidents that he is right to plough through historic envionments and thrust a great tower into the skies next to the Hermitage. That's just progress - people should accept it or go back to ploughing fields with oxen.

You know, I'm deeply jealous of Fred and his team. Progress is a way of life for them but here in Auchterness, the McTaggart family can't even have people round for dinner in case the house sinks further into the bog with the extra weight. I'm sure this sort of thing is making Auchterness unattractive to incomers. We must act soon and commission Sir Fred and his dynamic team to produce a vision for our community. I will speak to the Board next month. In the meantime, look out for more cutting edge opinion from Auchterness.

The Sunday Herald, Trump and the RTPI

2009-11-15T16:51:00.013Z

You know, there's another ridiculous article in the Sunday Herald today about the latest fuss around the Greatest Golf Course in the World. I walked down to the wee shop before breakfast and by the time I got back with the paper I was so angry I had thrown away the sports section and the colour magazine.

Apparently the Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI aka the Goons in London), which represents 22,000 town planners in the UK (including me unfortunately) is examining a complaint that "Dr Christine Gore, director of planning for Aberdeenshire Council, failed to act with integrity and independence while handling Mr Trump’s application for a £1 billion luxury golf resort".

Well if you believe the RTPI are having an enquiry then you will believe anything - they are busy extracting as much cash as possible from their membership and can't afford to alienate anyone with an enquiry. After all there is a plush London office to maintain and decent salaries with company cars to pay for.

But the point here is that every good planner colludes with developers to get things moving - it's the only way to make any progress. And the main reason they collude with developers is that they want a better job - usually with the developers. Yes, they want to get out of local government as quickly as possible! I can't understand why anyone thinks there is anything wrong with this or that it is unusual in any way. In other words this is another non-story dreamed up by the gutter press to besmirch the good name of Donald Trump and his lovely family. Today I'm ashamed of Scotland - again.

ps - these great images are from www.zimbio.com, Photos by Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images Europe.

The nasty side of Sccotland

2009-11-15T15:30:00.007Z

You know, this blogging business isn't easy for someone with a sensitive disposition - like myself. Over the past two months, since I've been bringing people the good news about important developments around Scotland, I've been subjected to a stream of abuse and flames, some in comments but most of it in emails accusing me of all sorts of things. This culminated in a ticking off from Graham Stewart of BBC Radio Scotland about my reaction to his programme on the Great Donald Trump. Also, I was advised that I had a place reserved for me up against the wall come the revolution as a result of my article about Union Terrace Gardens.

I've been very busy for the past week which has kept my mind off this as well as the heartbreaking goings on with my lovely wife and her young lover. To be honest, I've thought of giving it all up but I always come back to the unmistakable truth. Scotland is on the brink of a New Enlightenment fuelled by enterprise, innovation and property development driven by Donald Trump, Sir Ian Wood, Clydeport, Forth Ports, Peel Holdings, Asda and Halfords- truly Scotland is open for business. Many people don't seem to realise the importance of this and live in a dwam - others such as the wasters, gypsies, unemployed and farmers living in their railway carriages, black houses and butt-and-bens throughout the land just want to ruin everything through delay and opposition. Still, a lot of them managed to climb out of their begging bowls to phone the BBC recently - though I believe this was not orchestrated by Graham Stewart, who is not a communist.

Anyway I have an important article to write on Donald Trump, Aberdeenshire Council and the RTPI - as well as preparing the online voting for the Auchterness Oskars later this month - so I will get on with that. Thanks to everyone for their support and interest.

Radio Scotland - enough is enough!

2009-11-01T20:59:00.008Z

You know, I'm absolutely furious with BBC Radio Scotland and their presenter Graham Stewart, who is probably a conservationist - or worse. I heard part of the programme about the Menie development on Friday morning but stormed out of my house after a few minutes, slamming the door behind me. Of course I'd locked myself out which made things worse.

So I've been trying to write a new post about other important matters of the day but every time I sit down at the computer I can only think of this disgraceful broadcast which tried to besmirch not only the good name of The Great Donald Trump but also his son Donald Trump Jnr, a man who drives a tractor with style and panache! People in the office say I'm obsessed with the Trump development but it's just a healthy concern for the economic development of Scotland and the part that we town planners can play in it. At the same time, I know if I had a more settled home life I could maybe take it all in my stride.

It seems clear to me that the BBC is completely opposed to this fantastic development. Their strategy seems to have been to assemble queues of wasters and layabouts at public telephone kiosks around the country to phone in a deluge of insults and one-sided economic and environmental arguments that don't hold any water. Now the purpose of this escapes me given that work is already underway and soon the Great Donald Trump himself will tee-off, celebrating a total victory over the inbred luddites of Aberdeenshire and the once treacherous sands of Menie which he will have tamed.

I'm shocked that some people have attacked Donald on a very personal basis. I know for a fact that as a Scotsman, an architect, a developer and entrepreneur par excellence, he is set on achieving the very best for the country. He is also kind and considerate - for example I heard recently that one day when he was out horse-riding near the family home in Stornoway, he came across a bird with a broken wing lying beside the road. He took the bird in his large hands, comforted it, sheltered it inside his riding jacket and took it home. At enormous cost, he flew specialist veterinary assistance from the mainland to his home and within weeks, the bird was able to continue on its journey.

That's the sort of man who is subject to all this vilification. Radio Scotland! You should be very ashamed!

Trump tees off - with Pampas Grass!

2009-10-29T21:30:00.009Z

You know, the sheer brilliance and ingenuity of my hero the Great Donald Trump never ceases to amaze me. Flying in the face of the gypsies and thieves camped out on the site of what will be the Greatest Golf Course in the World, Donald has set about stabilising the useless sand dunes that harbour midges, newts and other pests that may distract the golfer on his way round God's Own Golf Course.

But guess what he is using? Maybe I've given the game away to you gardening types who will know the answer immediately. Yes - Pampas Grass! Fantastic! Now this is highly technical work - sand dunes can move and are quite dangerous in the wrong hands. They can destroy a golf course in certain wind conditions and can even envelope tees, a fairway or even a golfer himself, so it's entirely appropriate that this problem is dealt with before the first round is played. Pampas grass is the recognised answer to this problem.

But this is not just to do with technical issues - there is the question of style. No one will want to play on a golf course that looks like a stretch of old sand dunes with bits of fields in between so Donald and his servile architect Gareth Hopkins have come up with the idea of coloured Pampas Grass. This is a fantastic innovation and I must admit I'm beginning to see the value in using this guy Hopkins - if it his idea of course. Pink will bring a touch of colour too and of course it reminds me of the expensive negligee I bought my lovely wife in happier times. But pure suburban style from Donald and his team.

My final word on this tremendous news for Aberdeenshire and for all the inbred loons living in old railway coaches and black houses around Menie is that soon your pockets will be bulging with cash as the trickle-down effect of Trump's goodness flows into your bank accounts. Jobs in table service, polishing shoes, washing cars and clearing drains will make you rich beyond your wildest dreams. Fantastic! This is regeneration in action and a great victory for Scottish Town Planners.

Sponsorship pays off for the Scottish Planner

2009-10-26T18:44:00.008Z

As my regular readers will know, I was mightily impressed with the new format for the Scottish Planner which came out in February of this year in a bi-monthly format - and in colour! For those of you who are unfortunate enough not to be qualified in town planning, the Scottish Planner - or the Journal of the RTPI in Scotland as it is subtitled - is usually an opportunity to keep up to date with the mind-dumbingly tedious gossip around the few folk who run the show in Scotland. But it also features articles by some of the greatest thinkers of our time - hardened professionals tempered by the fires of regeneration and property development.

In the current issue, the great Italian Planner Stefano Smith, Regional Director for Development and Design (Scotland and Ireland) at Halcrow Group Ltd, (what an impressive job title!) considers the next wave of business parks which will sweep over the economic landscape in the next few years, destroying small businesses and carving away at outmoded neighbourhoods like a knife through butter. This is a spanking article and a must-read in which planning in Dubai is mentioned - more than once! Halcrow really know what they are doing here and I'm filled with admiration for their deep dynamic thinking, their appreciation of transcendent themes and their blinding strategic innovation. I can't wait to see some real evidence of this on the ground, particularly in some of Scotland's smaller towns which have been waiting to be swept away like this for many years.

Now there is another important point here worth mentioning. Halcrow are sponsors of the Scottish Planner with Biggart Baillie LLP and together they have published an article in each of the issues since the new format was announced - three from Halcrow and two from Biggart Baillie. Some of my colleagues think this is corrupt and shameful - they are entitled to their opinion. Well my message to them is, "Let's have more please!" More news about business parks and less gossip and tittle-tattle will suit me fine. It is great that Halcrow have seized the moment and found a way to get their abundant skills across to the great unwashed of local council planners before other less worthy firms get a look-in. A great piece of work and my hearty congratulations to all those involved in this.

Glasgow Harbour leaves London reeling

2009-10-24T17:58:00.010+01:00

No doubt you are all agog this week with the news that planning permission has been granted for a colossal £1.2bn retail and leisure development at Glasgow Harbour. To say I'm excited is of course an understatement - I am literally trembling with anticipation as I write this. Glasgow City Council has dealt London a critical blow by clearing the way for this fabulous proposal designed to make Peel Holdings and Clydeport even more incredibly rich - no bad thing considering that the quality of their existing development at Glasgow Harbour has been recognised as having changed the course of regeneration across the globe. Peel and Clydeport deserve every accolade for this outstanding project. So Glasgow will have more shopping malls than London once the doors of this beauty are open, knocking the UK capital for six in the retail Top of the Pops.

Glasgow City Council is a partner in the Glasgow Harbour project and of course has given itself permission for this development as we would expect - Wee Alex Salmond's folk just have to rubber stamp it though this will be a formality. Local retailers have predictably greeted this proposal with howls of protest but of course they will be the first to start filling up the shop units.

Just a few comments from my expert town planning perspective. This will be one of a new breed of retail centres where there is little or no public transport - like Braehead just across the river, it will be unique. So it's possible that the traditional city centre will become a twilight zone for an underclass of shoppers using buses, trains or the subway while normal people drive to Glasgow Harbour or Braehead - this is positive and reflects concerns about today's inclusiveness agenda and providing for minority groups. There's something for everyone in today's exciting retail offer!

Of course there is the subway station at Partick Cross (run by the amazing set up called SPT who I have praised before). No one is going to use that to get to Glasgow Harbour - well you can see how busy it is in the nice wee photie above. Likewise the so called Fastlink LRT system will never happen - that is just a clever invention by Clydeport to keep the planning application looking good to quiche-eating objectors, beggars and layabouts who want to derail the project. Another transport option is boats on the river and it's possible that in the future, some will sail to shop at Glasgow Harbour as the perspective below shows.

Personally I can't wait for this project to happen. It's a truly great proposal and reflects well on Glasgow City Council town planners for their vision and the breathtaking intellectual powers they have brought to bear on the Clyde's Regeneration. No wonder cities around the world are looking at Glasgow and saying, "Why didn't we do that?"

Ferry Village and Renfrew Riverside

2009-10-23T00:03:00.009+01:00

One of the sparkling jewels in the crown of Glasgow's Clyde Waterfront regeneration is Renfrew Riverside. You can see in the wee photo above that it's like a scene from Star Trek or Battlestar Galactica. Braehead Shopping Centre and the Xscape look like UFOs that have landed in a car park - or perhaps they were shot down by one of the Royal Navy's finest destroyers in the course of refitting at BAE Systems across the river in Scotstoun! Either way, Welcome to the Clyde aliens!

I don't need to say much about Braehead that hasn't been said already - really, one of Scotland's top shopping centres and warm congratulations to the team from Glasgow City Council for promoting this golden nugget of retail heaven which includes Ikea, Comet, PC World and even Halfords.

Now this time, retail isn't the whole story. There is a small park designed by Ian White Associates - famously the landscape architects for the SECC just up river and what a splendid job they made of laying out the tarmac around that memorable work of architectural brilliance. Ian is a big favourite of property developers who want a simple low cost solution that doesn't get in the way of the buildings or car parks - he really bends over the drawing board to accommodate the biggest developers and is very much sought after.

But one of the star attractions for me is Ferry Village. The beautiful hand rendered drawing above by genius architects Young and Gault tells the whole story of untrampled loveliness envisioned for the future. This is an area around the Renfrew Ferry which once had a collection of derelict huts, ugly sheds and the like that used to be home to many small businesses and craftsman industries involved in repairing and storing boats. Doubtless there were also many scroungers and vagrants from Yoker - stowaways on the Renfrew Ferry - who had settled there in cardboard boxes, potentially spoiling the view from luxury flats.

Now with amazing foresight, the developers realised that this was undesirable in a waterfront regeneration scheme and got Clydeport (the dynamic team responsible for so much that is new and good on the Clyde) to kick them out, paving the way for some very attractive flats that will instantly appeal to the buy-to-rent market, divorced women and other people on social security. Called the Anchorage, this is a place of singular beauty and luxury - even though someone in the office said the interior looked like a bordello. The landscaping is simple and delightful as you can see below - eat your heart out Capability Brown!

It seems obvious to me that small businesses have no place on waterfronts of World Renown and it's ridiculous for people to kick up a fuss over their eviction. But the real twist in the tail is that having got rid of one second rate boatyard, there are now plans to have a proper marina nearby that will be exclusive and posh. That is lateral thinking and Edward de Bono himself would be proud of all the guys behind this incredibly clever and beautiful development. Isn't Scottish town planning truly magnificent?

Bathing and shopping in Aberdeen

2009-10-19T14:51:00.009+01:00

You know, there's nothing quite like a bracing stroll along an esplanade on a windy October day and as part of the outing, being able to pop into B&Q to buy a chainsaw with which to attack that dangerous bit of woodland near your house. This unlikely combination of bucket-and-spade and DIY is one of the foundations on which the Beach Boulevard Retail Park in Aberdeen is built. Of course that isn't the only link up between beach orientated leisure and retail. Many Aberdonians like Whiskas sandwiches so it's really convenient to combine a trip to Pets at Home with an afternoon picnic on the Golden Sands of the Silver City - fantastic!

Like so many cities nowadays, Aberdeen has its Big Wheel or 'Eye' and by a amazing piece of town planning, this is located next to the retail park. So it makes sense to take a trip on the wheel to look down on the retail park and plan your shopping trip - a really thoughtful touch.

Now one of the ground-breaking innovations at this retail park is that it is below sea level as shown in the photograph below - that's the influence of our Dutch cousins across the sea - so it's good to get a touch of the continent in Aberdeen. In case of fire, the whole area can be quickly flooded.

All in all this is a wonderful environment for the 21st century bather or shopper. The unusual combination of sand and retail park must recall holidays in Las Vegas for some. For others it's a bit like Renfrew Riverside - but without the river. Who would have thought of this innovative location for a retail park? There must be some very clever planners in Aberdeen so my congratulations to them for this foresight and invention.

Inverurie goes global!

2009-10-17T14:13:00.012+01:00

Now you might think that Inverurie is one of these dull Aberdeenshire towns where the residents are mostly inbred and have a limited vocabulary. In other words, a dump or as they might say there, a midden. Well that was once true but let me tell you that the town is really going places now! Yes, Inverurie has deepened its gene pool, burst open the green belt and let retail loose on the once green fields of Oldmeldrum Road - some people living there even speak English instead of grunting!

Although there is a glittering representation of top quality companies on display including Lidl, Argos and Homebase the real star in the heaven of the Inverurie Retail Park is Halfords. Unbelievable that such a quality store should come to such a backward area and completely reverse its fortunes but there you are - the magic world of Scottish property development is full of surprises. And it looks as though the very-much-in-love couple in the photo below are really thrilled too.

As you can see from the picture at the top of the page though, Tesco is just across the railway line from Halfords. This means of course that Inverurie town centre is now completely derelict - at least in terms of proper shops - although there will always be the coffee shops, candle and card shops run and frequented by frustrated middle class housewives that we've come to expect in second rate towns and villages like this - but they will be cleared out eventually.

So congratulations to Halfords, Inverurie Retail Park and those Masters of Gyproc, Stewart Milne Construction for this far sighted development which has completely turned the town around.

The best of contemporary Scottish house design!

2009-10-16T22:14:00.008+01:00

You know, it's a beautiful crisp night here in Auchterness and I wouldn't be surprised if the temperature dropped to freezing point later on. It's got me thinking about winter again and the torture of Xmas alone with my thoughts during these long nights. Fortunately I have in my hands, the latest issue of Building Scotland. I've referred to this before in glowing terms and if anything, this highly professional and cutting edge magazine seems more lustrous and packed with fantastic articles than ever. The shiny cover beckons me towards a feast of avant-guard design like the fabulous house shown above.

Recalling the best of traditional Scottish Building combined with the latest ideas in precision timber frame construction this is a cracker. It will be at home in any Scottish landscape or even in a town, where it will seemlessly blend with older buildings - particularly in Conservation Areas or adjacent to Listed Buildings. One note of warning though - council planners may interfere with the purity of the design of this jewel of architecture during the planning application process and this may result in the building being changed for the worse. I've seen it happen many times. For example they may ask for the colour of brick to be changed or for the intricate carved timber work around the eaves to be painted a different colour. My advice is to defy them.

Here's another one - unbelievably stylish. I especially like the red steps up to the front door and the pointed trees in the front garden - the neighbours will be green with envy. Anyway, without a chimney in sight, this is about as modern as it gets in Scotland today. My hearty congratulations to the team who created these masterpieces of contemporary design and to Building Scotland for daring to publish such cutting edge material.

Now I will return to writing my comprehensive appreciations of the remaining developments which will make up my end of year list, which I'm calling the Auchterness Oscars. These will include Renfrew Riverside especially the gem they call Ferry Village, the Beach Boulevard Retail Park in Aberdeen and....wait for it.... Halfords at Inverurie. Mouthwatering.

Gretna's Gorgeous Factory Outlet

2009-10-14T13:49:00.005+01:00

I'm sneaking some time out today from my hectic routine to bring you this exciting review of the Gretna Factory Outlet. You know, the first time I saw this magnificent creation I was on a bus down to London and I almost choked on my sandwich when I saw it flash by. Right beside the motorway shouting out, "Come and buy!", the sheer bravado of it all had me in meltdown. My hand is almost shaking with excitement as I write these words.

First of all let's deal with the location. On the actual border between our fair land and England it's the first thing you see of Scotland when you come up here from down there - retail bargains! It's what we planners call a gateway feature - that's one box ticked. Secondly it's a little bit special - this time we're looking at a development that is steeped in the Scottish tradition - yes pitched roofs with different colours of tile and buildings that look like old farm steadings housing over 50 stores as well as five cafes. Over 40 of these stores are shoe shops so it's a great place for pedestrians. That's 125,000 sqft of sumptuous leather retail. I usually prefer modern design but this is dead right for Gretna - like a piece of old Fife transported to the Border so a big tick there for conservation. It's also very popular with dogs and below you can see some of the top quality finishes and materials that have been used throughout.

Those of you familiar with the history of Gretna will know that women have always played centre stage in the industries of the town - originally in munitions factories while the men were away at the war. Today, if you are part of a pre-booked coach group you can enjoy a meet-and-greet service from beautiful young maidens dressed in tartan mini-skirts. This is sophisticated and tasteful, totally Scottish and a real boost for the modern industries of the town which include tanning shops, massage parlours and of course the wedding scene at the Old Blacksmith's Shop. Oh and one thing you might not know is that a car park is a virility symbol in the dynamic world of Scottish property development - it's size that matters - and you might say that Gretna is deeply fecund with its huge expanse of asphalt and neatly clipped hedges.

I was once given a Harris Tweed cap which a friend had bought for me in Gretna. My lovely young wife flushed it down the toilet after one of our rows but I recall that it was very stylish. Perhaps I'll get a chance to go there myself one day and replace it.

This is a work of profound ability, readily accessible by public transport too. For example if you left Inverness by train at 09:18 in the morning you could be in Gretna by 15:10 in the afternoon. Enough time to buy a pair of shoes and rejoice with a mug of soup. Yes, with so many boxes ticked this is a giant of the Scottish town planning scene and I commend it to you all.

The wonder of Stenhousemuir!

2009-10-12T18:45:00.010+01:00

You know, I'm sick to the pit of my stomach. I heard today from a friend of mine working in economic development for a Council in the central belt that Asda have successfully transformed the town centre of Stenhousemuir, casting aside years of traditional retailing and historic street pattern, building a huge car park and erecting an absolutely fabulous new store. Amazing and breathtaking. I'm sickened because really, what is so special about a dump like Stenhousemuir and why did Asda do that instead of looking north to Auchterness? Stenhousemuir is a name people associate with a terrible football team in the lower echelons of the Scottish amateur leagues - hardly a hotspot for regeneration I would say.

Anyway, let's have a look at the project from my expert planner's viewpoint. In the first place, I should say that this is being used as an example of good practice by Wee Alex Salmond's Scottish Government! Well, respect is due and I'm intensely jealous, but leaving that aside, you can see from the plan at the top of the page that this a stunning intervention and a real ball-breaker for the ineffectual bunch of whining shopkeepers that have kept Stenhousemuir down over the past decades. The development goes straight to the point - smashing through the old Main Street and establishing a new urban square of great wonder and style and suffused with continental atmosphere, where the oppressed people of the area can park their cars during the day, or have gang fights at night. That's part of the inclusiveness agenda I'm sure. Next, a bit of context.

Apparently there is more to this development than just Asda - there is a new park and public library (with a very unique style) and an elegant parade of new shop units next to the superstore - see above. This is all very good but people continue to whine. For example Janice King, manager of the Red Cross charity shop said: "Stenhousemuir's regeneration has hit us hard, most of the shops around us have closed down or moved and the old centre is now really quiet with very little passing trade. Since Asda opened we have seen a drastic fall in customers. People are avoiding this part of town and going straight to Asda where they can get cheap new clothes instead of walking through our doors." She obviously doesn't understand that this was the plan all along - boom boom! Another great success for 21st century retail and one in the eye for the fur-coat-and-nae-knickers charity shop brigade.

My hearty congratulations to all those involved in this outstanding project, especially to the guys from Macdonald Estates - the hardmen of the Scottish property development scene - and I should mention the previously unheard of architects too - Fouin and Bell - but I guess they just pulled the designs off the shelf or were given them by Asda. An easy win for them. But enormous praise of course to Asda for their breathtaking vision and community concern for this historic footballing town. It's a great result for the town and better than they'll ever get on the football field.

An emotional Sunday

2009-10-11T17:28:00.012+01:00

Well I've had a terribly emotional day. First of all I celebrated my fourth follower on Twitter by having sugar in my porridge instead of salt - funny thing that. I suppose it's something the English have brought to our fair land along with curry. Anyway, with the ghastly taste still in my mouth, I put on my dungarees and marched into the garden for some hard graft - I'm determined to have at least one flower and one vegetable next year.

So I was working away for about two hours when I heard a familiar voice. "Grandad! Grandad!" For one moment I thought my lovely young wife had decided to come back to me and had brought the boy. Sadly it was just my brother and my son - he was taking the boy out for the day, presumably leaving my wife and her young lover to enjoy carnal pursuits at their leisure. Apparently the wee boy had said, "Let's go to see Grandad!" and my brother obliged. I burst into tears. As I said previously, I am sure they are trying to poison my relationship with the boy by suggesting that I'm too old to be his father and that lover boy is his real father. Heartbreaking.

So after the boy had tired himself out running amok over my freshly dug flowerbeds and throwing lumps of earth at me we decided to go out for lunch. We went to a lovely wee caravan I know in a layby off the main road and had a greasy bacon roll each, washed down with a bottle of Irn Bru - fantastic. But then we had to say our goodbyes again. "Goodbye Grandad", he said - I felt completely crushed. But it's been a lovely sunny day here although with all this family business I'm afraid the garden has been left in a mess.

But with the sun going down, my mind has turned to matters in Aberdeenshire and the duplicity and cowardice of the Councillors in not granting the Great Donald Trump Compulsory Purchase Order powers to sweep the objectors from their homes. Does anyone remember the cartoons that once ran in a magazine called Leopard about a certain Councillor Swick? For those of you from foreign lands, Swick is a north east Scotland term for a cheat. Anyway, the cartoons are online now and you can see them here - you probably have to download them and print them a bit bigger.

It just shows you that there is a long tradition of snouts in the trough over there. Not that I'm suggesting for a moment that there is anything going on but it makes you think. There's no smoke without fire. I see that Tilda Swinton is in on the conspiracy too - just disgraceful - but if you want my opinion, I don't think she's a normal woman - if you know what I mean - so her views are completely worthless.

Union Terrace Gardens, Aberdeen

2009-10-10T22:31:00.011+01:00

You know, these community meetings are just a gossip shop and a waste of my valuable time. I've spent hours listening to people droning on about dog mess, discarded condoms and broken glass when I could have been watching Strictly Come Dancing. It just reinforced in my mind how great it is when people just do what they want and ignore the babbling pack of idle worthless peasants. Which brings me to a current hero of mine - Sir Ian Wood!

Now Sir Ian used to be my boss years ago in SE and even then I thought he was a mover and shaker - a Puppet Master for the hordes of creeps that inhabit the higher echelons of public service in Scotland. Sir Ian is now a multi-millionaire - maybe more - and while he is not as good looking as the Great Donald Trump, he knows a thing or two about town planning and is a true Renaissance Man for Scotland. It takes one to know one!

So Sir Ian has come up with his own plan to fill in the hole that is known as Union Terrace Gardens in Aberdeen. I remember he wanted to do that years ago so now he has kindly provided a cool £50 million or so to backfill the whole issue thereby putting an end to the ill-informed debate about park or arts centre or whatever. One of the stupid alternative proposals is shown below (notice they show a railway in the foreground - I thought we were trying to get rid of these and replace them with good roads).

So now we can just get on with it. A hole is a hole - simple - fill it in. You would do the same with a hole in the road. You have to admire that no nonsense approach to town planning. I was across in Aberdeen recently and have to agree that Union Terrace Gardens is unsafe, dark, sloping and green - that's my expert analysis from a town planning perspective.

Anyway he hired Halliday Fraser Munro who we know can really bash out a fuss free solution to anything - petrol filling stations, lock-up garages, you name it. What a job they have done - it's clean and flat and simple. Absolutely breathtaking in its bold conception, it's bigger than Trafalgar Square in London or St Mark's in Venice! Yes! Now Aberdeen can be a world city. It's better than wasting your time with community groups!

You see, you can always trust rich people to have the best ideas and to pick the best firms of designers to do their bidding.

Britney and the Showcase Leisure Park

2009-10-09T22:49:00.011+01:00

Many of my more intellectual readers will be aware of the symbiotic relationship between the property development industry, planning, leisure and sex. Well I don't like to bring it up as this is a respectable blog rather than a smutty alleyway of the wide world web. But remember that great story from 2004 when the lovely Britney was doing her Toxic Tour? Exactly. She hired all 28 lanes of the Hollywood Bowl at the Showcase Leisure Park near Coatbridge for herself and friends while performing two sell-out shows at the SECC in Glasgow. The point is that planning and sex had come together at the Showcase Leisure Park - which has never looked back! Even today, many beautiful young maidens from Coatbridge are called Britney after that momentous event.

Let's have a look at the place - looks great doesn't it? You know, the whole point of a fantastic paradise like this is that you can drive there with the window down, cruise round the car park with your arm hanging nonchalantly out of the window and yes, you can imagine you are in California. Designed by Walt Disney himself, Frankie and Benny's, the Showcase Cinema itself and even a Big Mac with a wifi hotspot are all there - mouthwatering. It's a great day out for the whole family of course.

When I was there, the car parks looked very special with nice twinkling green decorations, a bit like broken glass. Also there must have been a recent violent hailstorm as a number of car windows had been broken and the Police were in attendance. Good to know that safety and security are being taken care of there.

Yes, make no mistake. This is a top-notch premier development located in one of Scotland's greatest ever growth corridors - the M8 - just along the road from Eurocentral and the Bellshill Hilton, forming a sort of triangle of excellence which can probably be seen from outer space. I'll close now and prepare myself for a busy weekend of community meetings and gardening but I will be back soon with more exciting news and first class projects like this from the Scottish town planning scene.

Leith Docks - an epicentre of dynamic growth!

2009-10-08T20:38:00.018+01:00

I'm deeply privileged today to write a review of one of Scotland's greatest success stories of visionary planning and property development. It's a veritable dripping roast of invention and superlatives, truly the eastern equivalent of Glasgow Harbour in every way. The team that did the astonishing breakthrough thinking on this one are Forth Ports (who kindly donated the land), Turkey Associates and RMJM, they of the recent heroic failure at Custom House Quay in Glasgow. One word - wow!

You know, it's sometimes hard to take in the sheer comprehensive brilliance of some projects - the diamond sharp intellectual endeavour, the world class parametric design work not to mention the streetwise nous that can turn a derelict area into a thriving community of beautiful houses, shops and parks all wrapped up into one of the finest urban development frameworks you will see around Edinburgh since Wester Hailes was but a twinkle in a planner's eye. Recently a member of the Prince's Foundation described it as being, 'as good as Sierra Leone'. That's praise indeed coming from a world traveller and member of the Royal Family - a total pat on the back for Forth Ports and for Turkey Associates, a real feather in their cap.

But the dynamic team didn't have it all their own way. They were beset by hippies and ne'er-do-wells throughout the course of the work and even in the completed state that you see in the images above, organisations like JUMP are proposing a 'contra-plan' for the area. You can see this below and quite frankly, anyone who still uses coloured pencils these days is hopelessly off message.

This is typical of Scotland today and frankly there is every possibility that the sort of people who propose alternatives to the brilliant schemes of established and respected figures in the Edinburgh scene and elsewhere could usher in a new dark age for the country if their activities go unchecked. An age in which developments like Leith Docks, Glasgow Harbour, Eurocentral and the Bellshill Hilton simply won't happen. A worrying prospect for the nation so Alex Salmond, please take note.

Scotland - Open for Business!

2009-10-08T13:35:00.008+01:00

Well! No sooner had the ink dried on my emotional analysis of the mothballed dream scheme for Custom House Quay in Glasgow than a rescue plan was announced. 3DReid, those masters of pragmatism whose no nonsense commercial solutions march across our land, have stepped up to the plate to design a revised proposal for the embattled City Council. I can't wait to see the first impressions of this exciting and worthwhile project aimed at building where no one has built before! But there is more!

My attention was drawn yesterday to a proposal to build a £14,000/night billion pound resort at Kinloch Rannoch in Perthshire. Members of the exclusive club would be expected to have minimum liquid assets of £100 million. They would pay £2million up front to join, with annual dues of £500,000. A stay at the luxury hotel would start at £6,000 per person per night, rising to £14,000 for the best rooms. That will certainly keep the local riff-raff at bay - that's one in the eye too for the conservation lobby who are trying to preserve derelict stretches of old woodland scheduled for long overdue golf courses. Now while this fills me with almost unspeakable pleasure, in my expert opinion there are two flaws in the proposal - first of all, they've employed architects whose name I can't remember instead of someone good like 3DReid or Archial. Secondly, and this is where the architect's lack of vision really shows, they should have knocked down the adjoining village while they were at it as it is a well known dump of a place full of do-gooders and natives - ie troublemakers.

Anyway, this mouth-watering treat, together with the Trump development, Custom House Quay and the recent television documentary about Harris Tweed, demonstrate that Scotland and Auchterness are climbing the curve of success! Of course part of this means that amenity societies, local council planners, do-gooders and hippies just have to shut up and stop trying to oppose change and acknowledge that Scotland is Open For Business!

The tragedy of Custom House Quay

2009-10-06T20:41:00.010+01:00

I was almost reduced to tears this morning when I read that the Custom House Quay development in Glasgow had been mothballed. This is a major setback for Glasgow in its efforts to make the Clyde the envy of the world although with Glasgow Harbour, Specific Quay, Braehead Shopping Centre (big tick there) and the City Inn Hotel it is already on a par with Paris, Hamburg or Copenhagen. Still by the time I finished my cornflakes I felt a bit better as my mind analysed the project from an expert planner's perspective.

Now I haven't time to write a full appreciation of this but RMJM, the geniuses who came up with this fabulous proposal, have done an amazing job. Looking at the top picture, you actually can't see the river at all - what a great idea considering so many people always say what an uninspiring stretch of water it is. Another thing - the cars have almost disappeared and that's an amazing achievement - isn't it!

Look at this second picture and you will see how well the new architecture provides a backdrop to this new plaza with all those toffs and fancy looking folk strutting their stuff - not the Glasgow I remember but I can live with it. And once again, no cars or river views which is great though I don't understand why they kept that old building crumbling away in the background.

This third picture shows how the new development has magically brought an amazing number of boats right up the river to the city centre - canal barges too! Fantastic considering that the river is currently barely navigable. But really the main thing is the stupendous design of these towers. What a great way to show them off - in a line along the river front - a brilliant idea!

It's a tragedy that this has been mothballed due to an Australian going bankrupt. There is never a good time to go bankrupt and I'm sure his wife and family are very disappointed. Let's hope that the heart of this great development can live on in another body so three cheers for RMJM and their brilliant crew of designers!

Real town planners and the training disease

2009-10-06T18:18:00.017+01:00

You know, I've written before about Continuous Professional Development or CPD as it's called. Yes we can laugh about it sometimes but the junk mail I received from our masters this morning really pushed me over the edge. Spawn of the Devil! A collection of useless courses and conferences for numpties who want some time off to sleep for a bit.

Now most planners I know are battle-hardened professionals who have dedicated their lives to planning - taking responsibility for their own development - and that's the way it should be. But I know many people in local government are different. A wee sausage roll from Greggs gets everyone excited then a two hour trip to the toilet with the Daily Record or the Sun for a read and a wee sleep is nothing unusual, believe me. They're the ones who haven't opened the City in History since they left university and spend their time fabricating gross car mileage claims. By God I would force every one of them to subscribe to Property Week - which I don't mind telling you is now my bible - even though some misguided people think it as a Fascist pamphlet.

Looking down the list of courses in the junkmail I quickly realise something was badly wrong. Are they seriously suggesting that a qualified town planner needs training in subjects such as Retail and Town Centres, Sustainable Communities, Rural Planning and Regeneration or Housing Design? I just don't believe it! But if it is true, then these people should be barred from practice. Also if it's true that some planners have no skills in these areas then they shouldn't be giving the game away - it should be hushed up rather than publicised. I honestly don't know what the powers that be are playing at. I suspect it is just a money-making trick they are playing on the membership - buy our training or get your membership taken away. Disgraceful.

Anyway I'll shut up now before the goons in London swoop on me. If you get a chance to go on a day out like this, enjoy the lunch and make sure you get your CPD Certificate signed.

Asda Ardrossan - as good as the sausages!

2009-10-05T23:26:00.007+01:00

You know, I've always liked Asda's sausages - almost as much as that handsome young maiden who used to slap her back pocket in the old advertisements for the store. I always try to shop in Asda whenever I see one and the new Asda in the beautiful Costa Clyde town of Ardrossan is breathtaking. I have never heard of WCEC Architects but if Asda let them loose on this one, they must be completely top notch indeed - rivalling the thought leaders in the field like Archial.

It's a beautiful piece of work and it really suits the nice big green sign above the door that says 'ASDA'. In the picture above, you can see how dilapidated and out of place the surrounding old buildings look - 100% ripe for redevelopment from my side of the fence.

You see, what a scruffy old town centre like Ardrossan needs is a bit of competition - but if it doesn't work out, the guys with the boats in the marina can shop in Asda while the unwashed can shop in the various pound shops nearby. It's just common sense and part of today's exciting retail draw. It's the first and last thing you'll see on arriving or leaving Ardrossan on the ferry and how very 21st century that is! No more grim views of the old harbour and leaking boats - just a brand new marina and the best retail around!

Yes, this is another fine example of Scottish property development. My hearty congratulations to Clydeport for their vision in creating this absolute stunner. Breathtaking! But to finish, here's a picture of my favourite sausages. Great aren't they?

The Cowards of the County

2009-10-05T20:17:00.006+01:00

Ridiculous, absurd and treacherous. As some of you may know, Aberdeenshire Council took the coward's way out last week and delayed a decision on supporting the greatest development ever to be proposed in that part of the world - the Great Donald Trump's fabulous golf course and residential complex. Instead of approving the Compulsory Purchase Order procedures they choked on their brose and played for more time (looks horrible but that's what the inbred natives of Aberdeenshire eat 3 times a day!). Well the Menie Liberation Army had made up a 15,000 signature petition against the CPO so some of the spineless twerps were probably worried they would lose their seats in the next election. Snouts in the trough - why worry? I tell you, if a member of my family spent day after day writing made-up signatures on a petition I would be outraged.

Anyway, the point is that this was all part of Donald's plan - of course he wants more time to persuade the gypsies, tinkers, crofters and scrap merchants to sell up, and they will - just watch! But I'm horrified at the treatment that Donald is receiving in the press and to personalise this by mentioning his wonderful hair is almost too much to bear. Donald is a Patrick Geddes for the 21st century but it's typical of this foul-mouthed little country that our own heroes - like Andy Stewart and Billy Connolly - are treated as piranhas and have to face a barrage of abuse because they have visions while the great unwashed sit around watching River City. But that's life - a nation in crisis but nobody cares!

I'd better close now before I say something I shouldn't. I'll be back soon with my latest revelations about the superb Asda development at Ardrossan - breathtaking!

Terrific Tesco - Lucky Port Glasgow!

2009-10-03T14:45:00.007+01:00

At last I've managed to collect my thoughts on the Big Tesco at Port Glasgow, Scotland's biggest and best store. I've mentioned this so many times before and frankly I've been so overwhelmed by wonder and excitement that I wasn't able to put pen to paper. Where do you start with something as good as this and how do you start to explain all the complex cross-cutting themes that underpin this fantastic achievement? First of all let's get the disappointment out of the way - I don't know who designed this. Looking at the sheer panache and style it could certainly be one of my favourites but equally it could be SMC Parr or Halliday Fraser Munro - someone in the office said they both had a no-nonsense approach to bashing out entirely commercial solutions. This would fit the bill for Tesco - excellent in fact!

Let's have a look at another photo. In this one above you can see the sheer scale of the development - acres of car parking draining directly into the River Clyde which is a readymade filter bed for the SUDS system. Also you can see the way that the site has been built up from the surrounding ground level - this is required by new Scottish Government legislation which says that all new development must be built 2 metres higher than existing levels to prevent flooding. This means that while surrounding areas may be inundated and destroyed in the future, Tesco will be safe - a clever move. Incidentally this would mean that Park Page's stupid wee library in Port Glasgow's derelict town centre would also be destroyed - that will be a blessing for the town! Anyway, you can see that Tesco has a direct footpath connection to the riverside. This is so that dad and the kids can go down to the river and throw stones at empty Buckfast bottles while mum does the shopping - so it's a big tick for a family day out!

You could get lost in this Tesco and helpfully, in common with other Central Scotland superstores, pigeons are allowed to nest on the internal structure of the roof - so you just need to look up and see where the pigeons are and they can guide you to the checkouts. Pigeons inside, seagulls on the roof outside - Tesco have generously provided a huge roof (echoing the old shipyard buildings of the town) for seagulls to sit around on. No photovoltaics here though they are trying to put up a couple of windmills to show people that they are taking the sustainability agenda seriously. Well it's inevitable that some quiche-eating hippies will hang out there, buying petrol for their camper vans and looking to score points against Tesco.

Yes - this is a development of pure brilliance! Congratulations to everyone involved for their outstanding creative input and their care and concern for the future wellbeing of the area. Lucky Port Glasgow!

Trees and town planning

2009-10-03T12:04:00.005+01:00

You know, Mary Fisher's excellent comments on my last post about safety in urban areas and the dangers of trees in particular got me thinking about stories I've heard in the past years - well done Mary! I thought I would put these together into a sort of advice note for my fellow town planners who might be involved in ground breaking new developments - like me. The advice is about trees, perverts, head lice and sheep.

The first concerns a rather voluptuous young female friend of mine whose house and garden backed onto a railway line with an embankment covered in trees. The police arrived one day to tell her that they had arrested a pervert who had built a small hut in the tree overlooking her garden (and bedroom) and that judging from some of the newspapers found there, he had been watching her for almost two years! They also said he must have had a great time but I think this was unnecessary information. So my first bit of advice is to cut down all trees at the back of gardens and if you can't, obtain a long pole and closely inspect the upper branches for unlawful structures that may not have planning permission and may conceal a pervert. It may be possible to dislodge him.

My second piece of advice is about trees and sheep. You know, I like to think that Auchterness is a thriving metropolis - and it will be someday! But the reality for now is that it's still quite rural so we have farmers and sheep to deal with. Now any farmer will tell you that insects and infestations hide in trees and drop onto sheep grazing below when they are not looking. That's why you hear of things like ticks, blowfly and maggots hiding in shelterbelts infesting whole herds of sheep while flocks of cattle escape because of their shiny skins. So my picture above shows a dead tree and some sheep - that's the way it should be.

But wait - it's not impossible to imagine that trees contain human head lice too - you know the nice wee itchy things we used to share with our friends at school? If so, there would be a strong case for cutting down many more trees in rural and urban areas or at least spraying them with chemicals. We have a old guy called John McManus in the village who has an axe and usually cuts down things that are a nuisance - he enjoys it - so maybe I'll give him a phone next week and see what we can do.

A great underground experience!

2009-09-30T17:17:00.018+01:00

I meant to post this a few weeks ago when I was down in Glasgow looking at the ugly new Transport Museum emerging down by the Kelvin. I haven't been on the underground for years and boy was I impressed. Strathclyde Partnership for Transport (SPT) the guys who run this show have really got their act together in recent times with advertising plastered about all over the place - on walls, on trains, on windows, on ticket machines and even on the floors. It looks great! Far better than the original brown and cream look from the 1980s. I'll tell you something else - if you go to some Continental cities like Berlin or London you won't see anything like this. They haven't got the advertising bug or frankly, the sheer class, that makes Glasgow's underground railway so great - it's in your face and must swell the coffers of the company massively.

Another great thing is that they save public money by shutting down the escalators at the busiest times of day which also saves on maintenance costs. Oh yes and I forgot to mention the booming public address system that puts the fear of death into fare dodgers. Overall I'm very impressed that a public organisation pretending to be a private company behaves in this exemplary manner.

But the SPT got caught out recently by the Council. They installed beautiful silver bollards at each station entrance to stop people taking their cars down to the platforms - a sensible move as the stairs are a bit steep in places. Anyway the Council discovered this and asked the SPT to submit retrospective planning applications for the bollards. How petty! It's about time Alex Salmond wrote some new laws for town planners to make them concentrate on the things that matter and not harass fantastic organisations like the SPT over trivial issues.

Incidentally you'll see in the photo above, the legs of a beggar sitting at the entrance to the subway - that's quite typical in Glasgow and the sooner this is dealt with the better it will be for everyone.

By the way, I forgot to mention that you can 'follow' me on Twitter now! Isn't the wide world web so great?

Thank you Frankie and Benny!

2009-09-27T21:25:00.007+01:00

Well I'm back in my wee house now and feeling a little bit flat to say the least. I picked up the wee boy yesterday and we went down to Frankie & Benny's at Perth's St Catherine's Leisure Park - quite a long drive. It was a bit up market and we might have been better in the ever-wonderful KFC but there you go. But Frankie's is such a good looking place and I felt very much at home there. It cheered me up for a wee while and the waitresses were magnificent. Well done to them and thank you Frankie and Benny!

I wasn't at my best though and to be honest I was consumed with anger and jealousy at the thought of my lovely wife and her young lover enjoying the pleasures of the flesh while I was away with my boy.

But apart from having the dry boke for much of the day, I was able to see some positives in Perth's wee retail park. It's not great but the essentials are there - plenty of car parking and some great buildings - especially Halfords. Good enough for the people of Perth - most of whom are English anyway.

More attacks on my hero

2009-09-25T12:01:00.010+01:00

You know, sometimes I think Scotland is a horrible wee country. Look at the terrible things that people have done to statues across the land, trying to besmirch the good reputation of my hero Donald Trump. This is the work of the Menie Liberation Army, a bunch of sandal wearing nincompoops who are trying to halt progress on Donald's groundbreaking development just north of Aberdeen - and in the most childish manner possible. I'm confident that this will not help their case at all and that Donald will be triumphant! Businessman extraordinaire, developer, successful with younger woman, rich beyond measure and a genius - how good can one life get! Oh yes and 100% Scottish.

Anyway, this is the September weekend in many parts of Scotland and I'm going to see my young son for the first time in many months. As you probably realise, he lives with his mother - my lovely wife - and her young lover. I can't divulge details as I value his privacy, but I do wish he would stop calling me Grandad. It just isn't fair and I'm worried that they are poisoning my relationship with him. It's very upsetting but we will rise above it - maybe I will take him to a nice retail park somewhere - who knows.

Fantastic Eurocentral!

2009-09-23T22:57:00.010+01:00

You know, I could kick myself. I was down in Lanarkshire last week as you know and managed to have a quick peek at what must be one of Scotland's premier developments - the Bellshill Hilton. Guess what - I didn't use the opportunity to go and visit Keppie's big business park at Eurocentral near Holytown and Mossend just a short distance away! I used to go out with a lovely young maiden from Holytown but that's another matter. Keppies are one of Scotland's leading firms when it comes to building prestige developments on greenfield sites and really one of the intellectual powerhouses in the field. Certainly one of my favourite consultancies as you know.

Well they've really hit the nail on the head this time. I gather that this is a magnificent piece of work and the drawings look just great - wee Alex Salmond himself said he was "delighted". What a terrific honour and a real shot in the arm for the guys that put this together. Did you know for example that most of the people who will work there can drive there because there is plentiful car parking and easy access from the M8? That's one in the eye for the public transport lobby, crying into their sandals as usual. And the landscaping is truly luscious - a veritable green paradise of golf courses and ponds where wildlife can be communed with. Biodiversity is increasingly important in our complicated world so that's another box ticked. Also according to the Keppie press release there are over 27 football pitches on the site and 756,000 sq ft of grade 'A' office space - quite an achievement to get the buildings listed as Category A so early in their lives. Really I must make a special trip down there to visit this magnificent place - a Versailles for Central Scotland.

Yes this must qualify as one of my top developments of the year alongside the Bellshill Hilton, the Tesco at Port Glasgow and possibly the new Asda at Ardrossan which was built with the generous assistance of Clydeport who donated the land. They are also one of my heroes due to their world famous and excellent development at Glasgow Harbour. Really we are very lucky to be surrounded by such great projects and I feel slightly jealous that we haven't managed to achieve this at my wee Auchterness - so far.