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NUMBER ONE DEANSGATE is the name of a new residential tower under construction on the corner of Deansgate and St Mary's Gate.

Here we see its inexorable climb towards the sky. We can see stepped framework which will support the building's large sloping roof, similar to the Urbis Centre under construction on Corporation Street.

The lower picture shows the building as it looked in April 2001.

AN OFFICE BUILDING on Fountain Street has been demolished, opening up a gap in the street which reveals the Sunley Tower, Piccadilly Plaza, shortly to undergo major refurbishment.

 

SIR ROBERT PEEL has finally been removed from his pedestal at the corner of Piccadilly Gardens after over 150 years. It's July 2001 and Manchester City Council's redevelopment work on Piccadilly is well advanced.

The statue of Sir Robert Peel is to be moved to a new location.

We are looking through the metal barrier across the Piccadilly Gardens building site. Two construction workers in their reflective yellow jackets, pause for a chat.

We can still see the 1854 facade of the Portland Thistle Hotel, with the tower of 111 Piccadilly (formerly Rodwell Tower) behind it, but very soon, a new modern-style office block, named Number One Portland Street, will rise on the far end of Piccadilly Gardens, obscuring the hotel and everything around it.

A CONCRETE-WALLED JAPANESE-STYLE PAVILION with a long curved concrete wall function as a dividing screen, separating the bus and tram station from what remains of Piccadilly Gardens after the office block is built. The building is designed by award-winning Japanese architect Tadao Ando and is a centrepiece of the redevelopment plan for Piccadilly, masterminded by councillors in Manchester Town Hall.

In the upper picture we can see the 1854 facade of the Portland Thistle Hotel - This of course will be obscured by the new office building 'Number One Portland Street' when it arises on the former gardens.

As we move along the concrete wall, we can see how it obscures the view across Piccadilly Gardens - in the lower picture we can just see the white building on the corner of Oldham St, formerly Woolworths.

EWM says: A 10 foot high concrete wall through Piccadilly Gardens is the last thing it needs, even if, as it appears, the wall will eventually be covered by creeping plants. Now what structure I've seen on my European travels does this wall remind me of?!

THE CONCRETE WALL of the new Japanese pavilion, designed by Japanese architect Tadao Ando, bears a remarkable resemblance to the Berlin Wall - Both structures are around 10 feet high, made of white concrete and are intended to act as a barrier between one part of a city and another.

The function of the Berlin Wall, seen here at one of its most notorious sections (Bernauer Strasse), was to hermetically seal East Berlin and the GDR from West Berlin. A graffiti artist has painted a 'trompe-l'oeuil' hole in the wall. The Berlin Wall was put up by the East German government in 1961 and stood until their fall from power in 1989.

The function of the Piccadilly 'wall', as part of the Japanese Pavilion, is to screen the newly landscaped and considerably downsized gardens from the noise and bustle of the tram and bus stops. The Piccadilly 'wall' was put up by Manchester City Council in 2001. How long will this one remain?

EWM says: It's shocking to see a wall of bare concrete being erected through Piccadilly Gardens. Screening the gardens from the trams and buses is unnecessary and will diminish the size and impact of Piccadilly and the adjoining gardens, formerly one of the largest city centre squares in the UK.

BERNARD HOUSE, one of the three main structures of Piccadilly Plaza, built 1958 - 1965, has by summer 2001 disappeared. It had been in bad condition for many years, and was finally dismantled as part of redevelopment plans for Piccadilly Plaza.

In fact, the whole of the interior of this part of the Piccadilly Plaza podium has been gutted, in preparation for major refurbishment.

On the left of the picture we can see Sunley Tower, which is to be reclad, and on the right, the Metrolink tramlines and Mosley Street.

MANCHESTER IS CHANGING, much of it out of all recognition. These pictures document the stated policy of Manchester City Council emphasising bold new redevelopment rather than traditional style restoration and conservation. If the city centre was under the control of one of the neighbouring councils in the Manchester area, such as Salford or Trafford, - either jointly as with Manchester Aiport, or under sole control, things would probably look very different. We will only be able to judge the success of the current local council's redevelopment policy in a few years, once Manchester has settled down after the Commonwealth Games and the current building boom has subsided.

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