Posted Nov 3, 2006, 2:38 PM
|
|
Registered User
|
|
Join Date: Jul 2001
Location: Paris
Posts: 9,019
|
|
Growing It All Sky High
London plans a spate of dazzling new skyscrapers. But how will they look beside St. Paul's Cathedral?
By William Underhill
Newsweek International
Nov. 6, 2006 issue - Developer Irvine Sellar is thinking big. On the drawing board: a soaring £500 million pyramid right beside the Thames, designed by Italian architect Renzo Piano. "We believe that we are creating a building for London that Londoners can be proud of, and one that reflects Britain's position in the world," says Sellar. Clearly, he considers that position lofty; when completed around 2010, the 310-meter London Bridge Tower—known to locals as "the shard of glass"—will rank as the tallest building in Europe.
But perhaps not for long. "The shard" has plenty of upcoming rivals approved by London city planners—including a clutch of other eye-catching megaliths dubbed "the walkie-talkie," "the cheese grater" and "helter-skelter" by the press. Any post-9/11 security qualms have been forgotten as demand for space soars. By some reckonings, a dozen more skyscrapers could break the city skyline by 2020. And despite unease from the heritage lobby, the rage now is for bold projects that send a powerful message to the world. "This expresses tremendous energy," says Paul Burgess of British Land, the developers responsible for some of the biggest schemes. "This is a visible manifestation of our confidence in the future of London as a global financial hub."
Certainly, it's a break with the past. Up to the 1960s, city planners forbade skyscrapers—still the policy in central Rome and Paris. A glut of cheap, high-rise housing fed public distaste for unsightly towers. Since the early 1990s, a clump of superbuildings has arisen at the Canary Wharf development, a few kilometers downstream from the ancient financial district known as the City. But in the City itself, the tallest building remains the 26-year-old Tower 42, rising to a modest 183 meters.
Now big buildings are increasingly in vogue, thanks largely to London's left-wing mayor, Ken Livingstone. Once leery of developers, Livingstone now counts architect Richard Rogers, a champion of glossy modernism, among his paid advisers. According to city hall, well-sited towers are not just a lure for the business community; they make efficient use of limited space and ease London's growing traffic problems. This year the mayor gained new planning powers to overrule local boroughs that may be nervous about big-scale development. The public, too, appears to have rethought its opposition; one poll found that Norman Foster's Swiss Re building known as "the gherkin"—the first of the City's new-generation towers, completed in 2003—was Britain's most popular landmark.
That doesn't mean developers can count on automatic approval when progress and history collide. "The planning process is more challenging than in any other city where I have ever worked," says Lee Polisano of architects Kohn Pedersen Fox, which has won several high-profile City commissions. Richard Rogers only got permission for his latest dazzler, a 48-story wedge of glass and steel (the "cheese grater"), after he tweaked its design to comply with the regulation requiring that sightlines to St. Paul's Cathedral be preserved. "The history is London's unique selling point in the world market," says Steve Bee of English Heritage, the official watchdog that regularly tussles with the mayor and developers. This month a team of UNESCO inspectors will assess the likely impact of the new supertowers on London's landmarks. "Everyone accepts that the city has to thrive but for future generations you have to preserve these wonderful sights," says UNESCO's Neville Shulman. Who wants to see Westminster Abbey or the 900-year-old Tower of London against a backdrop of outsize office blocks?
The same commercial logic that demands the towers' construction may also limit their numbers. Whatever the city's short-term prospects, developers know that the property market can shift quickly from shortfall to glut. "Developers will only press the button once they are sure these buildings are commercially viable," says Martin Wallace, of property agents CRE Collier. And with plenty of new floor space now approved, sentiment in the field may be turning: last month plans for another 50-story megalith on the City's edge were dropped in favor of a modest low-rise block. Big is beautiful only when it's profitable.
© 2006 Newsweek, Inc
|