The Agony and Ecstasy of Cumberland Basin

Cumberland Basin sits in the south-west corner of Bristol’s complex system of waterways. The River Avon flows into the city under the iconic suspension bridge and here it divides into the Floating Harbour, kept behind lock and quay and the ‘New Cut’ which carries the tidal flow under the belly of the city’s docks until they both meet up again the other side of Temple Meads.

In the 1960s Bristol’s civic planners had a grand idea to solve traffic gridlock in the city centre. A huge ring-road was envisaged encircling the centre of the city and forming the inner most of several concentric circles. The proposed road cut through swathes of Hotwells and Canon’s Marsh and clipped the back of the city centre going along Park Row and round to Redcliffe and Bedminster. As with most of the grand civic plans of the 60s it was cut short by the conservationist and environmentalist movements of the late 70s and 80s. Evidence of the partial implementation of the plan can be seen across the city today. St James’ Barton Roundabout (aka the Bear Pit), the underpasses at Temple Way and the Parkway are all perhaps dubious testament to what was actually achieved.

A glimpse of the overall vision can be seen at Cumberland Basin, here the scheme as planned was completed fully and it’s quite a sight if you’re paying attention. The roads here criss-cross over three bridges, across locks and basins and in between fitting snugly onto islands that seperate the serene Floating Harbour and the muddy Avon. Coming from the city along Hotwells Road you come from a standard urban trunk road onto a miniature motorway with overhead signs pointing to such exotic locations as Taunton, Bristol Airport and Portishead. The one way system takes you over, around and under the bridges and slip roads before you come out either heading under the Suspension Bridge or out to the next concentric circle, the Avon Ring Road.

This is the pinch point for Bristol’s edgelands. The steep hills heading out of the city here constrict urban development, Leigh Woods and Ashton Court roll over the undulations and built-up Clifton perches opposite. There’s no smooth transition from grand Georgian terraces to rolling farmland. It’s all very jilting. This also means that Cumberland Basin is where the outer ring road is squeezed into the inner ring road bringing a great deal of traffic hurtling toward what was, until the 1960s a singular bridge. 

I find in the system glimpses of the architect’s sketches I’ve seen in planning documents of the time. The pedestrian entrances have spiral staircases that lead to inelegant perspex and concrete bus shelters. The control tower seems to be taken straight out of the Festival of Britain, it perches atop a slender pole looking down over the Plimsoll Swing Bridge. One of the slip roads curves salaciously leaving a circular patch of grass on which I found daffodils and a UWE student reclining. Underneath some of the many on-ramps Bristol City Council has utilised the dead space by squeezing a depot and offices into the voids. 

Further along the road curves off southward and is lifted off the ground by slender struts, a cycle path runs underneath and the surrounding area is green and lush and surprisingly quiet. Sustrans have had a hand here in recent years, criss-crossing the area with cycle paths and pedestrian routes. Spike Island on which the entire road system is sat has two large tobacco warehouses one of which houses a very millennial creative arts centre and record office. 

As you look back at the concrete bridges and waves of traffic you can see why someone who hurtles across in 20 seconds might think nothing of the system. Looking from the stately suspension bridge down onto the Ballardian bridges you can see why without thought someone might brand it ugly and monstrous. Not me though, I can see the intent here and it’s honourable, the pedestrian isn’t left to run across roads or dive into dank subways, they are given grassy walkways, spiral staircases and protection from the elements. Drivers are eased onward, swept up from the ring road and taken along the river, up into Clifton or down into suburbia. 

I’m not saying we should have demolished massive parts of Jacob’s Wells Road to join up the dots of this ambitious scheme. I just wanted to consider the scheme in context and perhaps imagine how Bristol would have looked if the ‘66 civic plan had gone ahead.

Central Library, Birmingham

Birmingham’s Central Library was built in 1973 as part of a pioneering plan for a new Civic Centre in Birmingham. In the optimistic spirit of post-war city planning a masterplan was hatched to construct not only the library but a School of Music, drama centre and a variety of shops and offices all interconnected with that familiar feature of 60s planning; elevated walkways.

The library was built and opened in 1974, and along with the Conservatoire it was the only major part of the plan to be salvaged before spending cuts hit. It is an inverted ziggurat with an atrium at the centre suspended over the ring-road (and what was proposed to be a bus station). The ziggurat forms the reference library and next door is the much more modest lending library with it’s three story, convex façade, see (here).

The library is being replaced next year by the new Library of Birmingham. I am certainly not the kind of person to bash a new library being built and it’s possible that Birmingham needs it but I’d like to think there was a better reason to spend millions of pounds on a replacement just because what is currently there is ugly. In my humble opinion the architecture employed at the new site is a post-modern mess, a perspex box covered in barbed wire that hasn’t a patch on the original. See (here). 

The 38 year-old library will be demolished in 2013 once its replacement is open and this, well this is a travesty. The biggest issue as far as I can see with the exterior is the lack of windows, a lack which inspired everyone’s favourite architecture critic, Prince Charles, to proclaim “it looks more like a place for burning books than keeping them”. There is some truth to that, the exterior looks Orwellian even if the intention was to protect books from sunlight, see (here), but the interior, the light-filled atrium and the high-windows of the entrance hall are a different story. 

These days it’s another victim of our tendency to let buildings decay until we can justify demolishing them. The concrete cladding is stained and in poor condition but then it hasn’t been cleaned since the early 1970s so that’s no surprise. In 2001 the tall entrance hall was ruined by the addition of a perspex lobby which gives way to the atrium, redesigned in the 1990s from civic space to miniature shopping mall complete with McDonalds and Wetherspoons. 

I would love to see this building saved. It has so much potential, an iconic lump of architecture soon to be emptied right in the heart of the civic centre of Birmingham. The atrium lends itself perfectly to a more fashionable renewal, reinstating some pools of water and trees and replacing the tacky 90s shop units with something more akin to a high street. Above the library spaces could be converted into offices or flats, the concrete exterior could so easily be painted white and perhaps some of it dismantled to allow for larger windows. 

Another idea that’s been floated is the creation of a TATE West Midlands. This could work especially well in such an iconic space, I’d love to see walkways across the atrium connecting different galleries and the smaller lending library being turned into a museum or offices for local creative organisation. Whatever happens it’s going to be a crying shame when the buldozers come. Just as we look back to 1971 and wonder how people could have been so blind as to demolish the elegant Victorian building we’ll look back on 2013 and wonder how it is that we replaced this slice of architectural history and vision with a perspex box covered in barbed wire. 

Birmingham Central Library by Alan Clawley (here)
‘A Place where books are incinerated not kept’ by Ben Flatman (here) 
Library of Birmingham on RIBA Blogs (here)