Christmas Sabotage!

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

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

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

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

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

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

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!