{"id":1957,"date":"2025-12-09T09:42:28","date_gmt":"2025-12-09T09:42:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/?p=1957"},"modified":"2025-12-09T09:42:28","modified_gmt":"2025-12-09T09:42:28","slug":"communist-blocks-scheme-poised-to-go-ahead-daily-business","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/?p=1957","title":{"rendered":"‘Communist blocks’ scheme poised to go ahead \u2013 Daily Business"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\"Summix\"Summix
The design of the Gateway development horrified the public<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A plan for new housing on the edge of Edinburgh that was likened to the brutal architecture of Communist Eastern Europe looks like getting support from the city council.<\/p>\n

Architect 3DReid\u2019s project will replace a disused paper factory close to the Gogarburn roundabout and busy Maybury junction.<\/p>\n

The scheme occupies a 6.3ha brownfield site and is backed by regeneration specialist Summix Capital. <\/p>\n

It is part of the ongoing development at Edinburgh Gateway, close to the site of the former Saica packaging plant. A 170-bed hotel is included in the plan.<\/p>\n

Release of images prompted widespread criticism on social media amid claims that new developments do not complement the city\u2019s graceful historic architecture.<\/p>\n

\"Maybury\"Maybury
Featureless blocks of apartments will provide a thousand homes<\/em> at Maybury<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"\"\"\"
New housing in La Garenne-Colombes, France, echoes the elegance of older architecture<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Planners say: \u201cIt is recommended that this application be granted.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe proposal will form part of the emerging area in West\u00a0Edinburgh\u00a0as envisaged in the development plan.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, one commentator described the Gateway scheme as being \u201clike Plattenbau in East Berlin\u201d, while another lamented that there was \u201ca global movement towards this gulag style in architecture.\u201d<\/p>\n

Peter Lederer, former managing director and chairman of Gleneagles Hotel added that it was \u201clazy, cheap architecture\u201d. Social media specialist Fin Wycherley said: \u201cLooks like we\u2019re moving more and more into a prison state.\u201d <\/p>\n

Company director Greville Warwick described the scheme as: \u201cFeatureless Square blocks. A form of Lego architecture.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Peter\"Peter
Peter Lederer: \u2018lazy, cheap architecture\u2019 (pic: Terry Murden)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Ian Tyler, an independent chair, non-executive director and senior adviser, said: \u201cI suspect that even battery hens would refuse those lodgings!<\/p>\n

\u201cThis \u2018ugliness\u2019 disease is not just an Edinburgh disease but across the whole of the UK. Architects seem to have lost all sense of beauty.\u201d<\/p>\n

In its submission to the council, the applicant said: \u201cThe flagship vibrant new neighbourhood aims to\u00a0deliver a mix of uses.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis includes the delivery of more than 950 homes, including 35 per cent affordable homes, plus a new hotel with over 170 bedrooms.\u201d<\/p>\n

Saica relocated to new premises in Livingston.<\/p>\n

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