London has one of the most distinctive skylines in the world.
But according to the results of a survey released this week, Londoners are strongly opposed to further expansion of high rise buildings throughout the capital.
An Ipsos MORI poll found that 59% support controls on the number of buildings which can be built higher than 50 floors – a tenacious opposition which 2016 seems to have borne out.
From the objections to Camden Council’s Somers Town, to the scrapping of the so-called Paddington Pole in January, the year so far has been ruled by the skyscraper scaremongers.
Yet, contrary to local opinion, we should be celebrating – not restricting – London’s expanding skyline.
Standing at an impressive 254m, the Paddington Pole was dubbed the “Paddington Shard” in an attempted smear campaign by the anti-skyline mob – before it was effectively scrapped.
Is the comparison to the real Shard meant to be an insult?
Hailed as “London’s new emblem”, The Shard is a striking example of what modern, cutting-edge architecture can achieve.
Since being awarded first place at the 2014 Emporis Skyscraper Awards, it has gone onto become one of the most distinctive buildings in the world.
But back in 2002, English Heritage – an out-dated organisation allergic to change – did their utmost to block its conception, describing it as “a shard of glass through the heart of historic London”.
Their discouraging attitude of integrating buildings of the past with those of the present is backwards, unprogressive, and ultimately doomed.
There is no reason why St Paul’s can’t live alongside One Blackfriars; the Palace of Westminster alongside the Gherkin.
Even when – as with Somer’s Town in Camden – the development comes with a £1billion stimulus for the area, including a brand-new school, cynics still try to bring it to a halt – to protect the view over Regent’s Park.
It’s still unclear whether their fears it will “fundamentally harm” the area lies in its funding of a local primary school, or social housing projects.
London is a bustling, sprawling and cosmopolitan city that leads the pack on everything from nightlife, to culture, to business; we boast some of the most distinctive buildings in the world.
It’s been rapidly expanding for decades – beyond both the stretch of the M25, and the height of Big Ben. That shouldn’t stop now.
The calls to put the brakes on London’s expanding landscape are wrong. In order to keep up with our cutting-edge title, we need to keep building.
Londoners should ignore the white-brick snobs of English Heritage and Historic England, desperate to shackle our capital to eras of a bygone past.
They have been wrong before, and as long as they restrict the expansion of a forward-thinking and diverse skyline, they will be wrong again.
It’s time we stopped prioritising saving a bushy vista over securing a child’s education, building houses in a city that desperately needs it, or keeping the city on the cutting edge.
The British capital needs to shed this growing fear of vertigo – because there’s only one right direction, and that is up.