News / floating harbour
Huge changes ahead for area around harbour
Huge changes could take place in numerous areas around the Floating Harbour over the next two decades.
The changes could include a new cross-harbour ferry service from the Lloyds Amphitheatre to the M Shed, new commercial “activities” along Narrow Quay and a new watersports centre at Baltic Wharf with a satellite location in Mardyke Wharf.
One eyebrow-raising proposal is a lido within the docks outside what is currently the caravan park and what has planning permission for more than 150 new flats of which the city council-owned Goram Homes recently pulled out of buying the affordable housing element.
is needed now More than ever
A lido next to Baltic Wharf could complement the existing harbour swimming – image: Bristol City Council
Wapping Wharf is envisaged as “Bristol’s equivalent to London’s South Bank, a go-to place for culture, play and hanging out”; while Canon’s Marsh “will be consolidated as a fresh, contemporary focal point for Bristol’s civic and public life”.
The area around Albion Dockyard near the SS Great Britain could be “reinforced as a significant hub of creative and maritime industries”, and a mixed-use development created on The Grove next to the Thekla.
They are all part of the city council’s new ‘harbour place shaping strategy’ which “sets out a broad and ambitious vision for the future of the harbour and its next 20 years of growth and transformation”.
The ‘vision document’ is unsurprisingly packed full of buzzwords: the docks are described as a “waterborne park” with the potential of offering “a unique playable quayside”.
Also unsurprising is that the harbour will be revenue-generating, or in the words of the vision, “the development of the harbour will underpin the sustainability of the Harbour and Docks Estate”.
Redcliff Backs provokes the eternal question of why is there sometimes a missing ‘e’ in Redcliffe? – photo: Martin Booth
Andrew Brown, chair of the economy & skills committee at City Hall, said: “The harbour place shaping strategy provides us with an opportunity to guide and coordinate future development of the areas around the harbour and the water space itself.
“We want to create a strategy that will encourage residents, businesses and our communities to work together to rejuvenate our historic harbourside and make sure Bristol has a thriving and accessible destination that can be enjoyed by our city’s growing population and an increasing number of visitors.”
The harbour place shaping strategy was prepared for Bristol City Council by DK-CM – a Shoreditch-based “practice of architects, researchers and strategists who work in public to create spatial, environmental and social change” – and funded by the West of England Combined Authority.
To find out more and to take part in the harbour place shaping strategy consultation, visit www.ask.bristol.gov.uk/harbour-place-shaping-strategy-consultation
Main photo: Martin Booth
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