6 ms·

Liverpool stripped of UNESCO World Heritage status

50 points by bananapear 5y ago

s_dev 5y ago
Sounds like the UNESCO was very consistent at least. Telling Liverpool authorities long in advance that the changes would have this impact and then following up on that. I'm not sure anyone can really be that surprised. Sounds like Liverpool made a very intentional trade off and will have to live with it.
- rjknight 5y ago
  That's my understanding of the process too. The historic docks are hard to redevelop. The Albert Dock was successfully redeveloped and includes museums and an art gallery, along with various cafes and tourist destinations. That can't be repeated for the whole waterfront. Although the docks are historically _important_, they're not really that interesting to visit. They are immediately adjacent to both the city centre and light industrial sites further to the north, but don't add any value in their own right. Sympathetic redevelopment might have been possible in some cases, but I think the city would benefit more from development of something of modern relevance. I'm not totally convinced by the Liverpool Waters[1] plans, but they're at least more likely to generate sustainable economic activity. [1] https://liverpoolwaters.co.uk/ https://liverpoolwaters.co.uk/
  - dkdbejwi383 5y ago
    The execution of Liverpool Waters so far is pretty crap. Reading-on-Sea.
maccard 5y ago
I'm not a Liverpool resident but I do live in a UNESCO site myself. I'm glad that they are willing to show they have teeth and pull the status from people who are ignoring their guidelines If we bulldozed the Taj mahal and put a football stadium there, it would rightly be stripped of its status. I don't know why Liverpool thinks they would be special except; > "I find it incomprehensible that Unesco would rather Bramley Moore Dock remain a derelict wasteland, rather than making a positive contribution to the city's future and that of its residents," she said. This isn't a binary decision. Instead of leaving a world heritage site to decay to a point where it's the cheapest place in the city to bulldoze and buolda football stadium, investing in maintaining the area would " make a positive contribution to the city's future" to use their words.
- chrisseaton 5y ago
  > I don't know why Liverpool thinks they would be special Liverpool culture in general is to see itself as something a bit different to the rest of the UK, and to have a bit of a defiant attitude to authority and what anyone else thinks. There's a lot of historical and political reasons why, some that are still very raw in people's minds. > Instead of leaving a world heritage site to decay to a point where it's the cheapest place in the city to bulldoze and buolda football stadium Right - they should have maintained and used the docks in sympathy with their heritage, rather than just erasing them entirely.
  - sprafa 5y ago
    That's the whole point. You can repurpose the buildings within reason, that's what they've done in Porto where I've spent some time. Porto used to have lots of derelict buildings in its Heritage area, they've been rebuilt according to strict rules and it's fine.
  - celticninja 5y ago
    which means turning them into more expensive flats, which the majority of residents cannot hope to afford. It has been the case for plenty of others parts of the docks, hide new stuff in old buildings. but there comes a point when you dont need more flats/apartments
    - chrisseaton 5y ago
      Part of the reason why they lost the status was the high-rise glass buildings they built. What's in them? If you took that space and put it in buildings in the docks instead they'd be in a better position.
    - maccard 5y ago
      Nobody is claiming that the only thing to put there is flats or apartments (except you). They also don't need to keep all the existing buildings, they just need to retain the character of the area. You can build a new building there as long as it's in keeping.
iso1631 5y ago
So UNESCO status means a stagnant city that never changes? Liverpool is a working city, not a museum. By all means it should be respectful to its heritage, but also respectful to continue the the development that made that city worthy of UNESCO status in the first place, and continue it. If anything, not developing a progressive industrial city, keeping up with the times, would be worthy of removal of UNESCO status. The city made the right choice.
- gostsamo 5y ago
  Unesco status mean that you preserve the past.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- chrisseaton 5y ago
  > not developing a progressive industrial city, keeping up with the times, would be worthy of removal of UNESCO status I don't know if you literally don't know what UNESCO is, but the point is the opposite of promoting 'progressive industrial' development of historical sites.
  - iso1631 5y ago
    The irony being Liverpool is not a historical site - it barely existed until the 18th century. It's known for its industrial heritage.
    - chrisseaton 5y ago
      There’s been quite a lot of world history since the 18th century. Think of some of the events seen from these buildings, like the announcement of the sinking of the Titanic - that building was recently restored. And I think Liverpool has some architecture world firsts - first curtain wall I think. Plus aren’t other major industrial sites heritage sites? Saltaire? So I don’t see the irony that you do.
foobar1962 5y ago
My initial though was "OMG were the Beatles immigrants?"
kitbrennan 5y ago
If anyone's curious to see a bird's eye view of the dock: https://www.google.com/maps/@53.4245822,-3.0041219,527m/data=!3m1!1e3 https://www.google.com/maps/@53.4245822,-3.0041219,527m/data... Wikipedia also has an image of the listed building on the dock (a type of UK protection for historic buildings): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bramley-Moore_Dock https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bramley-Moore_Dock According to the development plan, the listed tower will be re-developed as well. Currently, the entire site is inaccessible (including the listed building), and sits behind locked gates.
tupac_speedrap 5y ago
I used to work in Manchester and my commute to work on the tram was pretty bad. A lot of heritage buildings were derelict or they demolish them and build yuppie tenements and fancy lad shit that is tacky and generic like in Salford Quays.
- iso1210 5y ago
  The Irish remdelling in 1996 improved the centre of Manchester. I haven't lived or worked there for a long time, but I was interested to watch Manctopia [0] to see how modern development was effecting the city [0] https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000lwn1 https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000lwn1
  - smcl 5y ago
    In case anyone did not get it, "The Irish rem[o]delling in 1996" is referring to an IRA bomb set off in the center of the city: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Manchester_bombing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Manchester_bombing
  - blibble 5y ago
    > The Irish remdelling in 1996 this is a very callous way to refer to terrorists detonating a 3300lb bomb in the middle of a city centre, which injured 212 people I don't think Americans would be very pleased if you referred to 9/11 as "Saudi remodelling"
    - iso1210 5y ago
      Given that Americans were the ones paying for the IRA to blow up Manchester and kill kids in Warrington, I'm sure they'd be fine. The sentiment comes from the Labour MP Terry Rooney ("The best thing that ever happened to Manchester"), although it was widely echoed by many people with similar dry humour.
    - BoxOfRain 5y ago
      That reminds me of the story (possibly apocryphal) about the American tourists who went to Belfast of all places and asked for an "Irish car bomb" in a pub. I'm fairly sure the second-hand embarrassment is still radiating across the Atlantic.
627467 5y ago
Isn't the point of being a UNESCO WH site that you value preserving and leverage the vestiges of the past to you benefit? Sounds like this city never managed to leverage the past to their benefit and thus made the right call to move on. Own your decision.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
leg100 5y ago
> Liverpool has seen more peaks and troughs than most, and it's a city which has changed immeasurably since 2004 when the World Heritage Status was conferred. > Back then, there was no Liverpool One shopping centre, no hint that Everton would consider building a multi-million pound waterfront stadium and its year as European Capital of Culture hadn't happened. The city has changed. Who gives a flying toss. Pretty much every city on earth has a ubiquitous monolithic shopping centre. It doesn't mean shit. Nor does a big football stadium (and how does "considering" building a stadium "change" a city?).
- soco 5y ago
  They are free to have them of course, nobody ever argued with that. But don't pretend the monolithic shopping centre is "world heritage". It's very simple - it doesn't look anymore like it was 30 years ago when it qualified.
  - chrisseaton 5y ago
    > But don't pretend the monolithic shopping centre is "world heritage" Nobody's pretending that - you're responding to an imaginary argument.
- chrisseaton 5y ago
  > Who gives a flying toss. Pretty much every city on earth has a ubiquitous monolithic shopping centre. It doesn't mean shit. Nor does a big football stadium (and how does "considering" building a stadium "change" a city?). I don't think that's what the author really means and I don't know if you're not familiar with Liverpool. 'Changed' doesn't mean 'they just built another shopping centre'. Liverpool before the Duke built Liverpool One was in another bad slump, after many bad slumps for many decades. The change wasn't the new shopping centre, it was generally the start of a bit more confidence and optimism in the whole city. Lots of things came together to make that change, and it's certainly in a better place now. Possibly they think the world heritage status, as well as the Paradise development, were means to ends.
- airhead969 5y ago
  City cores are typically concrete, commercial wastelands. The "good stuff" that brings character to a city overall is almost never megadevelopments, but preserving neighborhoods. East Austin is an example.
vagrantJin 5y ago
Winning a premier league title and the scousers go nuts. Maybe being a WHS isn't as financially valuable as having an elite footballing culture that brings in many more millions from around the world.
boublepop 5y ago
> "Places like Liverpool should not be faced with the binary choice between maintaining heritage status or regenerating left-behind communities and the wealth of jobs and opportunities that come with it," he said. He seams to not understand what heritage means. Liverpool can renovate as much as they like, they can even tear down the older buildings if they like, but they can’t be a UNESCO heritage site while doing so, and that should be obvious to everyone.

50 points by bananapear 5y ago

Sounds like the UNESCO was very consistent at least. Telling Liverpool authorities long in advance that the changes would have this impact and then following up on that. I'm not sure anyone can really be that surprised. Sounds like Liverpool made a very intentional trade off and will have to live with it.

rjknight 5y ago
That's my understanding of the process too. The historic docks are hard to redevelop. The Albert Dock was successfully redeveloped and includes museums and an art gallery, along with various cafes and tourist destinations. That can't be repeated for the whole waterfront. Although the docks are historically _important_, they're not really that interesting to visit. They are immediately adjacent to both the city centre and light industrial sites further to the north, but don't add any value in their own right. Sympathetic redevelopment might have been possible in some cases, but I think the city would benefit more from development of something of modern relevance. I'm not totally convinced by the Liverpool Waters[1] plans, but they're at least more likely to generate sustainable economic activity. [1] https://liverpoolwaters.co.uk/ https://liverpoolwaters.co.uk/
- dkdbejwi383 5y ago
  The execution of Liverpool Waters so far is pretty crap. Reading-on-Sea.

maccard 5y ago

I'm not a Liverpool resident but I do live in a UNESCO site myself. I'm glad that they are willing to show they have teeth and pull the status from people who are ignoring their guidelines If we bulldozed the Taj mahal and put a football stadium there, it would rightly be stripped of its status. I don't know why Liverpool thinks they would be special except; > "I find it incomprehensible that Unesco would rather Bramley Moore Dock remain a derelict wasteland, rather than making a positive contribution to the city's future and that of its residents," she said. This isn't a binary decision. Instead of leaving a world heritage site to decay to a point where it's the cheapest place in the city to bulldoze and buolda football stadium, investing in maintaining the area would " make a positive contribution to the city's future" to use their words.

chrisseaton 5y ago
> I don't know why Liverpool thinks they would be special Liverpool culture in general is to see itself as something a bit different to the rest of the UK, and to have a bit of a defiant attitude to authority and what anyone else thinks. There's a lot of historical and political reasons why, some that are still very raw in people's minds. > Instead of leaving a world heritage site to decay to a point where it's the cheapest place in the city to bulldoze and buolda football stadium Right - they should have maintained and used the docks in sympathy with their heritage, rather than just erasing them entirely.
- sprafa 5y ago
  That's the whole point. You can repurpose the buildings within reason, that's what they've done in Porto where I've spent some time. Porto used to have lots of derelict buildings in its Heritage area, they've been rebuilt according to strict rules and it's fine.
- celticninja 5y ago
  which means turning them into more expensive flats, which the majority of residents cannot hope to afford. It has been the case for plenty of others parts of the docks, hide new stuff in old buildings. but there comes a point when you dont need more flats/apartments
  - chrisseaton 5y ago
    Part of the reason why they lost the status was the high-rise glass buildings they built. What's in them? If you took that space and put it in buildings in the docks instead they'd be in a better position.
  - maccard 5y ago
    Nobody is claiming that the only thing to put there is flats or apartments (except you). They also don't need to keep all the existing buildings, they just need to retain the character of the area. You can build a new building there as long as it's in keeping.

iso1631 5y ago

So UNESCO status means a stagnant city that never changes? Liverpool is a working city, not a museum. By all means it should be respectful to its heritage, but also respectful to continue the the development that made that city worthy of UNESCO status in the first place, and continue it. If anything, not developing a progressive industrial city, keeping up with the times, would be worthy of removal of UNESCO status. The city made the right choice.

gostsamo 5y ago
Unesco status mean that you preserve the past.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
chrisseaton 5y ago
> not developing a progressive industrial city, keeping up with the times, would be worthy of removal of UNESCO status I don't know if you literally don't know what UNESCO is, but the point is the opposite of promoting 'progressive industrial' development of historical sites.
- iso1631 5y ago
  The irony being Liverpool is not a historical site - it barely existed until the 18th century. It's known for its industrial heritage.
  - chrisseaton 5y ago
    There’s been quite a lot of world history since the 18th century. Think of some of the events seen from these buildings, like the announcement of the sinking of the Titanic - that building was recently restored. And I think Liverpool has some architecture world firsts - first curtain wall I think. Plus aren’t other major industrial sites heritage sites? Saltaire? So I don’t see the irony that you do.

foobar1962 5y ago

My initial though was "OMG were the Beatles immigrants?"

kitbrennan 5y ago

If anyone's curious to see a bird's eye view of the dock: https://www.google.com/maps/@53.4245822,-3.0041219,527m/data=!3m1!1e3 https://www.google.com/maps/@53.4245822,-3.0041219,527m/data... Wikipedia also has an image of the listed building on the dock (a type of UK protection for historic buildings): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bramley-Moore_Dock https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bramley-Moore_Dock According to the development plan, the listed tower will be re-developed as well. Currently, the entire site is inaccessible (including the listed building), and sits behind locked gates.

tupac_speedrap 5y ago

I used to work in Manchester and my commute to work on the tram was pretty bad. A lot of heritage buildings were derelict or they demolish them and build yuppie tenements and fancy lad shit that is tacky and generic like in Salford Quays.

iso1210 5y ago
The Irish remdelling in 1996 improved the centre of Manchester. I haven't lived or worked there for a long time, but I was interested to watch Manctopia [0] to see how modern development was effecting the city [0] https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000lwn1 https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000lwn1
- smcl 5y ago
  In case anyone did not get it, "The Irish rem[o]delling in 1996" is referring to an IRA bomb set off in the center of the city: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Manchester_bombing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Manchester_bombing
- blibble 5y ago
  > The Irish remdelling in 1996 this is a very callous way to refer to terrorists detonating a 3300lb bomb in the middle of a city centre, which injured 212 people I don't think Americans would be very pleased if you referred to 9/11 as "Saudi remodelling"
  - iso1210 5y ago
    Given that Americans were the ones paying for the IRA to blow up Manchester and kill kids in Warrington, I'm sure they'd be fine. The sentiment comes from the Labour MP Terry Rooney ("The best thing that ever happened to Manchester"), although it was widely echoed by many people with similar dry humour.
  - BoxOfRain 5y ago
    That reminds me of the story (possibly apocryphal) about the American tourists who went to Belfast of all places and asked for an "Irish car bomb" in a pub. I'm fairly sure the second-hand embarrassment is still radiating across the Atlantic.

627467 5y ago

Isn't the point of being a UNESCO WH site that you value preserving and leverage the vestiges of the past to you benefit? Sounds like this city never managed to leverage the past to their benefit and thus made the right call to move on. Own your decision.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

leg100 5y ago

> Liverpool has seen more peaks and troughs than most, and it's a city which has changed immeasurably since 2004 when the World Heritage Status was conferred. > Back then, there was no Liverpool One shopping centre, no hint that Everton would consider building a multi-million pound waterfront stadium and its year as European Capital of Culture hadn't happened. The city has changed. Who gives a flying toss. Pretty much every city on earth has a ubiquitous monolithic shopping centre. It doesn't mean shit. Nor does a big football stadium (and how does "considering" building a stadium "change" a city?).

soco 5y ago
They are free to have them of course, nobody ever argued with that. But don't pretend the monolithic shopping centre is "world heritage". It's very simple - it doesn't look anymore like it was 30 years ago when it qualified.
- chrisseaton 5y ago
  > But don't pretend the monolithic shopping centre is "world heritage" Nobody's pretending that - you're responding to an imaginary argument.
chrisseaton 5y ago
> Who gives a flying toss. Pretty much every city on earth has a ubiquitous monolithic shopping centre. It doesn't mean shit. Nor does a big football stadium (and how does "considering" building a stadium "change" a city?). I don't think that's what the author really means and I don't know if you're not familiar with Liverpool. 'Changed' doesn't mean 'they just built another shopping centre'. Liverpool before the Duke built Liverpool One was in another bad slump, after many bad slumps for many decades. The change wasn't the new shopping centre, it was generally the start of a bit more confidence and optimism in the whole city. Lots of things came together to make that change, and it's certainly in a better place now. Possibly they think the world heritage status, as well as the Paradise development, were means to ends.
airhead969 5y ago
City cores are typically concrete, commercial wastelands. The "good stuff" that brings character to a city overall is almost never megadevelopments, but preserving neighborhoods. East Austin is an example.

vagrantJin 5y ago

Winning a premier league title and the scousers go nuts. Maybe being a WHS isn't as financially valuable as having an elite footballing culture that brings in many more millions from around the world.

boublepop 5y ago

> "Places like Liverpool should not be faced with the binary choice between maintaining heritage status or regenerating left-behind communities and the wealth of jobs and opportunities that come with it," he said. He seams to not understand what heritage means. Liverpool can renovate as much as they like, they can even tear down the older buildings if they like, but they can’t be a UNESCO heritage site while doing so, and that should be obvious to everyone.