2014 looks to be an exciting year for developments in Belfast, after such a long lull. I've made a start creating a thread to bring together all the current projects in Belfast under construction and proposed. I think it's helpful for non-Belfastians to have an 'at glance' look at what's happening in the city.

I'll be updating the list constantly but if fellow Belfast/NI forumers could contribute by posting updates/info I'd be grateful. I'll add any new links/info/projects to the list.

 

Thanks, good summary - nice to see some big projects starting up.

What about Brunswick Street Tower? Was it not approved already? And next phase of Streets Ahead? Would be great to see that commence too.

 

Yeah it's approved, just hadn't added it yet.

Streets Ahead Phase 3 won't be starting until 2016, according to FutureBelfast. Bank Square is however under construction and I think we may see work on Library Square this year.

 

Any ideas about the old Technical College building beside Inst? It's such a large building I can't really see anything other than it being converted into a hotel - no bad thing in that location, linking together the Ibis with Jury's, Fitzwilliam, Europa and then Days in an almost continuous ribbon.

 

A number of months ago (maybe as long as a year ago) it was reported that it was being purchased by an unnamed hotel group. It all went quiet after that.

 

A handy and very useful website for searching for planning applications.

http://www.geopii.com/planning/

 

Very useful! Wasn't aware of that site.

 

New QUB School of Law application posted.

Queen's University Belfast Main Tower site redevelopment to provide a new School of Law and student cafe/amenity area incorporating the partial demolition extension and remodelling of the former Library Stack the recladding of the Peter Froggatt Centre, the linking of the two buildings to each other and the Lanyon Building, associated landscaping works and revised access arrangements.

http://epicpublic.planningni.gov.uk.../PublicAccess/zd/zdApplication/application_detailview.aspx?caseno=MZ2WLOSV30000

They've been working on the Lynn Building (old brick/stone library) for a few months, gutting the interior and carrying out pipe and utility works. That'll become the new Postgraduate centre. I'm looking forward to seeing proposed renders/drawings of the library stack and PFC cladding and link building.

 

New QUB School of Law application posted.




They've been working on the Lynn Building (old brick/stone library) for a few months, gutting the interior and carrying out pipe and utility works. That'll become the new Postgraduate centre. I'm looking forward to seeing proposed renders/drawings of the library stack and PFC cladding and link building.

Very interesting.

I always wondered what would become of the "old new" library, the unloved tower block.

It looks from those elevations that they are going to reduce its height.

It was considered too high in scale for the conservation area. You could see it sticking up behind when you view the classic Queens frontage from the main gates, and I suspect this lower elevation means thats no longer the case.

It also looks like they are going to "close off" the quadrangle by joining this new library to the Peter Fogatt centre.

On the whole I think the scale of the new building looks better.

Don't get me wrong: I like my skyscrapers. But in this case the height detracted from a very beautiful campus.

 

Nice to see the drawings up. Seems they're reducing the stack height by 8m. Really like the idea of using brick, glass and bronze panels on th PFC, stack and new link. I think this will look fantastic once finished and the enclosing of the quad is a great idea.

 

Wasn't aware of this proposal until posted on FutureBelfast. This combined with the public realm work will make this a fantastic, and impressive, resource for the city.

On 17 September 2013 the Culture, Arts and Leisure committee proposed a motion that the Assembly "recognises the economic, cultural, social and educational benefits that a regional library for Northern Ireland would provide; and urges the Minister of Culture, Arts and Leisure to engage with Executive colleagues and other partners to pursue Belfast Central Library's redevelopment plan to create a regional library as part of the overall 'Library Square' project."

The redevelopment proposals for Belfast Central Library are being designed by Todd Architects under the strategic partnership that exists between Libraries NI, Belfast Education & Library Board and Amey FMP. The redeveloped library will be accessed from Library Square and visitors will enter a three storey glazed entrance hall linking the original red sandstone building with a modern extension.

http://www.futurebelfast.com/royal-avenue--central-library.html

 

*wolf-whistles*

That's a nice addition to Central Library. I was last in there just over a year ago, and I have to say the interior and facilities were a bit of a let-down in comparison to the beautiful exterior.

Let's hope this project involves a refurbishment of the existing interior.

 

I found an alternative proposal here - http://www.niassembly.gov.uk/Docume...brary-for-NI/3-Belfast-Central-Library-A-Regional-Library-for-Shared-Future.pdf

 

Application for a new acute mental facility at the City Hospital was submitted in November 2013

Location: Belfast City Hospital 51 Lisbura Road Belfast (Site bounded by
Coolmore Street and Dunluce Avenue car park of NI Blood Transfusion
Service and Glenview Building) BT9 7AB

Proposal: Demolition of existing hospital/vacant buildings and construction of
replacement acute mental health inpatient facility, car parking, realignment
of access roads and associated operational development.

http://epicdocs.planningni.gov.uk/ShowCaseFile.aspx?appNumber=Z/2013/1333/F

An architectural competition between the six selected teams was held by the NHS Trust and our proposal was selected in 2012 for development between the design team and the Trust. The project has now been submitted for planning permission and a start on site on the building itself is expected in the Autumn of 2014, with a completion in 2016.

The design is extremely unusual in that it eschews the usual ward plan solution of a central corridor arranged into a cruciform off which are found individual bedrooms and at the centre of which are found the various social facilities for the individual wards. By contrast, our plan arranged the five main wards around a garden with bedrooms on three sides of the garden and social facilities on the other. A single sided mostly glazed circulation corridor acts as a quasi cloister, an interesting link back to the monastic early hospital type. Wards are then be placed back to back so that a discreet service route serving two wards together with non-patient facilities can be efficiently co-located. This arrangement of wards focuses patients on the generous garden space at the heart of each ward and this itself becomes a major facility for the patients to use. Another highly unusual feature of the design is that the five wards are accessed by a circular open cloistered courtyard. The entrance to the hospital is more of a “gatehouse” connecting the outside world to this circular court. Patients and visitors pass through this gatehouse and back into the world of the garden before entering their individual ward. It is hoped that the experience of using the hospital by patients, staff and visitors alike will be one dominated by the experience of moving through and around gardens rather than the usual equivalent of moving through endless corridors.

Individual rooms also benefit from having their own pitched roofs and the entire building is serviced by a first floor services zone so that the maintenance of the building can be completely separated from the clinical areas. The wards currently consist of male, female, mixed, psychiatry of old age and a psychiatric intensive care unit. A master-plan for the site has identified a second phase which when complete will see the psychiatry of old age moved and another mixed ward becoming available within the first building. Car-parking sits between the two phases and access to the new hospital is via a second circular court. In addition, there is a discreet entrance for distressed patients and also a service entrance.

 

That's a pretty controversial project if (as the drawings indicate) they are going to knock down Windsor House in the Grounds of the City Hospital

It may not be fit for purpose as a mental hospital but it's such a small portion of this site that I can't for the life of me see why it's not listed and protected from demolition.

 

Bit of a disgrace to be honest, very little of the original hospital left as it is. Is the old nurses home behind MBC still there?

 

No that's been demolished. QUB are building a new Centre for a Experimental Medicine there.

 

There's another building in the grounds that is similar to Windsor House, close to the train stop. The City Hospital estate has a lot of flaws. Bradbury Court is one of Belfast's tallest residential towers but the great views are marred by the crap Blood transfusion building on one side and the new Queens building on the other. Windsor House is hidden amongst buildings to the front and rear when it should be exposed to view and a bit of sunlight. Big hospital estates like this often have a good bit of architecture here and there but the effect is always ruined by ugly extensions, pre-fab shite and unsympathetic new wards squeezed into small spaces where they shouldn't be. It's like there's an add on to the NHS charter that says that hospitals must be developed to create an institutional & depressing environment that is conductive to keeping the patients sick. :lol:

Funnily enough it wasn't that long ago that they were thinking of moving all the mental health units to Purdysburn. Is there any word on what's happening to the Broadway tower blocks at the RVH, because the lack of maintenance on them suggests some or all of them are going to be mothballed.

 

Visual impact statement for the new QUB School of Law has been published. The planned renovation and removal of floors from old library stack are going to make a big difference. The changes to the Peter Froggatt Centre are also to be welcomed, the proposal looks very good.

http://epicdocs.planningni.gov.uk/ViewDocument.aspx?uri=1986305&ext=PDF

 

Visual impact statement for the new QUB School of Law has been published. The planned renovation and removal of floors from old library stack are going to make a big difference. The changes to the Peter Froggatt Centre are also to be welcomed, the proposal looks very good.

The Visual Impact statement is very good. As I suspected, one of the goals of reducing the height is so that the classic front-view of QUB is enhanced (one does not now see the library tower behind when viewing from the front).

Also the inside of the quad looks a lot nicer when the tower height is reduced.

 

The QUB renovation looks superb. Here's a little comparison of with the current bulidings:

Currently abandoned library building (ugly tower block in background):

After refurbishment:

Peter Froggat Centre currently:

Refurbished:

The new renders look great. Is there a proposed start date?

 

The new renders look great. Is there a proposed start date?

The old tower is in the process of being gutted, work started on that before Christmas. The planning application was submitted in November so hopefully a decision soon.

Work has also been on-going to gut and restore the Lynn Building, which is the old building in front of the tower.

 

Student accommodation blocks in Lennoxvale

Planning ref - Z/2012/1210/F

A traditionally styled group of apartment blocks.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-26209477

I am with the Local residents on this one.

 

Planning ref - Z/2012/1210/F

A traditionally styled group of apartment blocks.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-26209477

I am with the Local residents on this one.

I'm not, I'm in favour of the development.

The scale has been reduced after consultations with the residents and the apartments are going to be for international students who are no where near as anti-social as our local lot. The building being demolished it a rather ugly and insignificant building that was built in the 1950's roughly. The grander buildings are being retained, restored and extended to suit the needs to house QUB international students. The whole Lennoxvale area will look a lot better than it currently does and the area will only improve once the old science library is replaced by the new building that'll house the Institute for Global Food Security and School of Biological Sciences.

 

Glad theyre getting rid of the old hideous library tower block!

 

Judging by the proposed site elevations the Lennoxvale buildings seem sympathetic to the area. The ceiling heights differ from the existing buildings but they seem to be spaced out enough for this not to matter. Of course the devil is in the details and my main worry would be that the classical look they are going for will be badly executed and they will clearly look like modern buildings. But that remains to be seen. What does strike me though is that the area only seems to have three or so households at the moment so placards by residents stating that it's their area are misleading when surely Queens is the major stakeholder. Replacing the existing university buildings with housing is only going to bring more people into the street after 5pm. That doesn't seem like a big deal given that it's the less rowdy international students.

 

Queen's have made some poor development decisions in the past but for the past 10-15 years they seem to have learned from past mistakes and their recent projects show a lot of consideration for quality and design. The Lennoxvale plan looks really good IMO, the original plan I wasn't in favour of but the revised plan is a lot better.

 

DoE recommending refusal for 48 - 50 Great Victoria Street

 

Pity...do they say why? I liked the look of it.

 

Yeah

The BCC planning committee will review it this week.

1. The proposal is contrary to Policy BH11 of the Department's Planning Policy Statement 6: Planning, Archaeology and the Built Heritage in that the development would, if permitted, adversely affect the setting of The Crown Liquor Saloon, 46 Great Victoria Street, Belfast, a building listed under Article 42 of the Planning (NI) Order 1991 by reason of its detailed design which is out of keeping with the listed building in terms of form, scale, massing and proportions and uses building materials and techniques which are unsympathetic and out of keeping with those found on the listed building.
   
2. The proposal is contrary to Policy BH12 of the Departments Planning Policy Statement (PPS) 6: Planning, Archaeology and the Built Heritage in that it would, if permitted, would have an adverse impact on the setting and character and appearance of Belfast City Centre and Linen Conservation Areas by reason of massing, proportion, form and materials.

Even though the Crown is surrounded by hideousness currently....

 

Again, backwards thinking by the Planning dept. Anything decent that comes along is mothballed just as quickly as it was presented, all in favour of mediocrity revised plans with sub-standard appearance.

 

That's shocking. The Crown is surrounded by medium-rise buildings on all sides, almost all of them ugly.

What a farce.

 

I like the way they made an effort to make the first three floors have a similar feel to the crown... And it is subsequently rejected. Meanwhile, as BUG pointed out, there is an incredible amount of muck in the immediate area. Muck that sailed through planning years ago. Would love the DOE to explain their rationale for opposing this; given the fact that Great Victoria Street is a total and utter embarrassment, they better have good reasons.

 

The previous tall buildings were built ten to fifty years ago so the Planning Service could argue that it happened under the watch of their predecessors, weren't me guv and another seven storey building (while in character) is only going to make a bad situation worse.

What puzzles me is whether it was the same team who rejected this who approved the Boat beside McHughs. It's a very similar analogy.

 

What puzzles me is whether it was the same team who rejected this who approved the Boat beside McHughs. It's a very similar analogy.

I'd love to hear their views as well. I don't think the DoE actually know what they're talking about most of the time. I have no idea how the Boat with it's ugly concrete wall was approved yet this building was rejected. Don't even start me on Aurora.

I think the proposal is actually rather nice and I appreciate the architects considering it's setting and amending the design accordingly.

The only hope is with the planning appeal being lodged.

 

There have been some very strange decisions made by planners regarding Great Vic Street.

This project is directly opposite a major transport hub (in a few years other transport infrastructure will be consolidated onto that street, making it the single biggest communications hub in NI, possibly all of Ireland), yet decisions seem to be in favour of keeping density as low as possible in some sites, while others can get away with minimal quality control. Surely this is where it makes sense to have a critical mass of accommodation for travelling business people and tourists (which is exactly the market this project was to cater for).

This latest news implies that any building more than 3 stories tall within sight of the Crown Bar will be refused. Which basically means EVERYTHING around the Europa.

The render above shows that from street level, the facade matches the form and height of both the Crown and Dorchester House, while removing the inappropriately sited bar that currently resides there, and conceals the brutally ugly side of Dorchester House. Yet it still gets refused.

What an absolutely absurd state of affairs.