Something related to a pension fund they are the investors in I think (I might have that wrong but a Walesonline article on the weekend mentioned it - I can't link to it from where I currently am sorry).

However, its interesting that a local authority is investing some of its cash in a pension fund that is developing sites in other authorities don't you think? It makes you realise that the land purchasing activities that have been going on between CCC and WAG in relation to some of the enterprise zone sites are clearly happening elsewhere.

Does anyone know how common this sort of activity is ?

Been given planning permission subject a S278 agreement and 42 other conditions (street lighting, landscaping etc.) the masterplan has already been revised 8 times to reflect subtle changes such as the removal of the "stopping up" order on St Mellons Road.

There is understandably widespread objection to it, most of the complaints raise legitimate issues with increased traffic mixed with a lot of NIMBYism.

Hodge House has been acquired in a £18.8m deal by Legal & General Property.

http://www.walesonline.co.uk/business/commercial-property/hodge-house-acquired-188m-deal-6505930

Are you saying that they're leaving the St. Mellons Road rat run in place afterall?

The framework of the atrium students union is on the way up.

Didn't know where else to put this -

http://www.walesonline.co.uk/business/commercial-property/welsh-government-considering-key-sites-6528493

It seems that the WG are looking at purchasing 2 sites in central Cardiff. The first is the corner plot at the north eastern part of CS. A red brick warehouse was demolished here a few months back. I always thought that with a bit of tlc that could have been converted into an attractive building which would have provided a nice counterpoint to the newer buildings and a reminder of the area's former industrial heritage, but what do I know?

This is a key site I think and could possibly link CS with Capital Quarter with access over the dock feeder that runs through it.

The second site is currently owned by two engineering firms which must mean it's situated on Dumballs Rd. Bellepheron are currently purchasing land between Dumballs Rd and the river for residential development (inc. 50% affordable housing) in what appears to be a joint venture with the Council. I wonder if this site being looked at by the WG will be earmarked for more residential or commercial.

Also WG still own part of CS south side which they are thinking of selling on to the Council who may or may not be looking at building a convention centre there.

I think on balance this is good news and points to an intention by the WG to get the enterprise zone going (in the absence of private developers this seems to be the only option) but with Capital Quarter, both sides of Central Station, CS, Dumballs Rd and Capital Waterside all in various stages of development I wonder if there is a risk that focus will be dissipated and we will end up with a large number of unfinished developments?

Looks like work on the old Habitat unit is imminent. Lots of building materials have arrived and hoardings are being erected outside the Hayes Island frontage. We know Miller and Carter Steakhouse will be an occupier of one of the three proposed units - does anyone know the identity of the other two or can hazard an educated guess?

Pieminister confirmed to be opening in St Mary Street in mid March. This on top of Brewdog's announcement that they are opening in Westgate Street seems to suggest that Cardiff is on the radar of the more 'trendy' chains.

I'm glad Brew Dog are coming to the city but I wish they hadn't chosen such a terrible unit. It means that the ground floor commercial in that building will be fully let (as well as the office space) which makes it possibly one of the most successful office schemes in the city despite being disgustingly ugly. Is there a moral somewhere?

I wish Brewdog - or someone - would take the plunge and open up in one of the very old buildings in Womamby Street (between Dempseys and Revs) that have had the exteriors renovated but are empty shells inside. Such a shame that they seem destined to remain empty.

Proposed swimming pool, leisure centre, gym and library for Splott, to replace the Star centre (planned to become housing). £9.2m. Built on site of existing pool in Splott park.

http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/local-news/campaigners-react-proposal-new-community-6557397

Yuk! So Cllr. Goodway is back in charge. The STAR centre site is to be sold off for housing while the only park in Splott is to have that pile of shit built on it. How does he get away with it?

There is also tremorfa park and moorland park. The star centre was actually built on the site of a park and it is well past it's prime. That part of the city gets shat on from a great height regularly so despite the architectural merits of the building it's refreshing to see something other than an industrial unit being built.

Yes, but... the park where the Star Centre was built isn't being restored as parkland it's to be used for housing - meanwhile Splott Park is going to see a rather-cheap looking leisure centre built on it.

People can argue over the architectural merits of the proposals but there is no doubting that there will be a loss of green space if the plans go ahead. The "industrial unit" arguement is specious. Are you suggesting industrial units would be built on the park if the leisure centre isn't?

The Star Centre is indeed past it's prime - so why not renovate it or replace it on the same site? That's what happened with the Western Leisure Centre and Channel View.

I'm confused. It's going on the site of Splott Pool, and in terms of green space will involve the loss of exactly one bowling green. This is hardly making a dent in Splott park, surely?

I reckon Karl was being facetious regarding the architectural merits

The industrial unit comment was just a general observation that the usual development we see in splott/tremorfa is stuff like viridor or the shit that cardiff community housing assoc throw up. Splott swimming pool plus the car park and the changing rooms already take up a fair bit of splott park. It seems that this development will take up an additional bowling green. That's a shame but not disastrous. As for returning the star site to parkland (which only became parkland when the old splott council school was demolished in the 1970s) - its a nice idea but where does the money come from to build the community hub? Splott park is actually quite big and tremorfa park about 500m up the road is even bigger.

I guess we will have to wait until there is a final plan for the hub until we find out how much green space of the park will actually be lost. IMHO both versions shown in the artist impressions appear to be bigger than the proposed development plot when you count the access and car parking - hopefully I'm wrong but it does appear that more green space than what has been reported will be lost.

The only time I've been to the STAR Centre a junkie tried to score drugs off me in the car park. The place is also as ugly as sin, so it's not exactly a great loss.

Does anyone know how this went through planning? It looks like scaffolding is going up around the building.

It looks like conservation area consent has been granted to demolish part of it. The planning application went to committee in December 2013 and was recommended for approval http://planning.cardiff.gov.uk/online-applications/files/6D230A668F067CF86C0C0AC58B590A70/pdf/13_01888_DCI-COMMITTEE_REPORT-1499561.pdf

I can't see the minutes from that meeting to see what was voted, but I assume the Members resolved to grant consent and the S106 has either been signed or is about to be.

Heath hospital daffodil to be replaced, potentially with some kind of anti-smoking image. Grotty lungs on the A48 anyone!?



http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/local-news/cardiff-hospital-daffodil-mural-replaced-6572746

Shame, I've always liked the daff on the side of the building

In other news today, I noted that the patch of semi boarded off land opposite the Golden Cross and the Radisson Blu has a small digger on it and the site is being cleared.....

Perhaps a 30storey tower opposite the raddison?

Seriously , I have often wondered what exactly they could use this piece of land for? One thi g is for sure though, this area of the city centre (CSq, capital quarter) has an awful lot of fallow land

I wish !

I'd rather they turned it into some simple green space if there are no plans to develop it. It looks pretty shit at the moment and doesn't leave a good impression. I've passed it quite a bit lately on train journeys and it bugs me.

Talking of that area of town, what's going on with Custom House and the plans to turn it into offices ?

I noticed that as well. I don't know why there is activity on the site but if I was a betting man I would say that it's something to do with maintenance of the railway and the adjacent bridge. There is a lot of work going on at Central and Queen St regarding capacity plus the bridge over St Mary St has recently been renovated/repainted.

Just an educated guess. I hope I'm wrong and the ground is being prepared for a new build but I think the keen observers of the council's planning lists that inhabit this forum (of which I am one) would have spotted something by now.

As for the Custom House and new build offices, there was a rumour that Morgan Cole were looking at this as a possible location once their current lease in Park Place runs out sometime this year or next. I think if they had plumped for this site we would have seen activity by now so I guess nothing will be happening in the short to medium term.

The Heath hospital daffodil has been replaced already, with a pic of a dragon with daffodils coming out of its mouth, and a no-smoking message. It lacks the character of what went before and looks a little naff to be honest.

unrealted to this thread but can anyone remember the huge lion mural that covered life and liquid. Surely I didn't dream it?

What happened to the corporation bus's water tower as well. The daffodil on that was a Cardiff institution.

I remember the lion mural and couldn't remember where it had been.

Used to be in awe of that lion mural as a kid!

So, does the pic of the day suggest work is happening on that site? Is there some sign of action bottom left? Or are they just clearing out the litter?

I walked past it two days ago and it just looked like they were leveling the ground with sand, not sure what they are going to do, maybe a surface car park?

New owner of the Hayes Island snack bar wants to reopen the underground toilets and run them themselves.

http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/local-news/hayes-public-toilets-due-reopen-6655299

Excerpt: "After opening in 1898, the toilets underwent a £148,000 restoration about four years ago and scooped a five-star rating at the 2010 National Loo Awards.

But Hayes Island Snack Bar owner Gavin Jones, who took over the business in October, said three weeks’ worth of work will now be needed to bring the toilets back up to scratch.

“We want to restore them to their former glory,” he said. “There is graffiti on the walls and they’re looking a bit grotty, and the original 120-year-old tiles have been painted over.

“We want to use a high-pressure steamer to remove this and take advantage of the original features of this beautiful building.”


What the hell? They spent almost £150k on a restoration 4 years ago and they need to hire a steam cleaner from Argos to remove the white paint on the wall tiles to uncover the original features !!!

Who did this restoration work, the Russian mafia?

Maybe they could convert it into a sandwich shop http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-21195520

I'm not so sure. Maybe it would be best just to turn them into a museum?

On a related note I was in a conversation recently when someone mentioned the victorian(edwardian?) baths that once existed in the centre of Cardiff. Apparently they were bulldozed. I do remember the ones in Manchester being restored on a TV programme a few years ago. Does anyone remember them? Where were they?

I think you are referring to Guildford Crescent baths. I seem to recall that there were three pools - one for men, one for women and one mixed as well as Turkish Baths. They had changing cubicles around the outside of the pool rather than changing rooms. I remember going there as a kid as an alternative to Splott swimming pool. I vaguely remember them as being a bit grotty by that stage and I don't think the building was particularly attractive (I could be wrong - at that age I was more interested in the Wagon Wheels in the vending machine than the architecture).

But it would be almost impossible to be worse than the building that replaced the baths - the foul Ibis hotel that vies with the surface car park at the back of the Rapports building for the worst part of Churchill Way.

@Karl

I never went to the Guildford baths (not that I remember) but how you describe them makes them sound like Withington baths in Manchester which were just beautiful. The changing rooms were about foot from the water.

That would be a shit museum.

do you really think so? I think it would piss all over what we have at the moment

To be fair I've seen crapper!

A Hayes Island Museum - They must be flush with money

I don't think Guildford Crescent Baths were anywhere near as grand as Withington Baths, although the set up around the pool was similar.

I did a bit of digging around and this article -

http://www.bathsandwashhouses.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/Allen__Fleming_7.10.08_Version_31.pdf

may be of interest. It refers to the Baths in particular, but also social conditions in Victorian Cardiff generally as well as the nationwide movement to build public baths. This ultimately resulted in Guildford Crescent Baths originally being built in the 1860's as a private enterprise, purchased by the Council in the 1870's before they either rebuilt or substantially increased the Baths in the 1890's. I think they must have been shut in the mid 1980's and demolished shortly thereafter. It's possible, given the era, that it's closure was motivated by a desire to save costs due to tightened local government budgets. A warning from history perhaps with the recent discussions about either New Theatre or St Davids Hall possibly being mothballed?

I also read elsewhere, but cant find the article now, that when Empire Pool was built it was one of only two Olympic standard pools in the whole of the UK (the other being in Blackpool) and that the original plan was to build an ice rink in the same vicinity as some sort of prototype Sports Village! That plan never came to fruition. Plus ca change as they say in Grangetown.

I learned to swim in Guildford Crescent baths.

My main memory is of the penny-in-a-slot Brylcream dispensers! The main (mixed) pool was quite attractive with a high timber roof broken up by skylights - the other two pools were smaller and had less ornate tiling.

I think they were demolished around the time that the big leisure cenntres were being built - the idea being that there shoud be a network of neighbourhood pools rather than a central baths. It was a nice enough building - certainly better than the Ibis which stands on the site - but I wouldn't say it was a loss on the scale of the Capitol, Wood Street Chapel or the Empire Pool.

Joking aside it's great news about the Hayes toilets, and especially since they have been renovated so recently, would be stupid for all that money to go to waste.

No obvious place to post this, so it is here.

recent, and rather sad, little video about Barry amusement park:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCQe-8-JP04

That brings back great memories, I used to love the Log Flume and remember getting the £3 red wrist band for unlimited rides in the park. Sad to see it all mothballed. I don't think the rides they put in for the summer now are up to much.

You really have - there are genuine Crappers Valveless Flushers down there. No joke.

Seems like they are going ahead with the Capital quarter.With shortage of land why is it that they don't build higher ?
http://www.walesonline.co.uk/business/business-news/jr-smart-gets-go-ahead-6697073

Let have this for the future:



"The new building, which will cost around £15m, will take between 15 to 18 months to complete."

shortage of land? you're not serious are you. Cardiff City Centre has plenty of fallow land sat idle doing nothing

saying that this looks a decent addition and will start to add cohesion to the site and make the development as a whole more integrated with the city centre (capital law etc).

lets hope they start on the bridge soon as this will help footfall making it feel more integrated

They have been working on the bridge for a while now.