The Piano Building debate Economic reality has to play a part

HIGHSTONE Estates and Centros Miller are investing £36 million in Weavers Wharf as part of the regeneration and extension of Kidderminster town centre.

This exciting retail and leisure development includes the refurbishment of two listed buildings, Slingfield Mill and the Pump House, thereby preserving for the future part of Kidderminster's history and link to the former use of the site for the manufacture of carpets.

In conjunction with the local authority and, we believe, with the support of the majority of the people of Kidderminster, we had been working for several months on the preparation of a detailed planning application to demolish the previously unlisted Piano Building.

In its place we had already identified two potential occupiers for a much-needed state-of-the-art six screen cinema.

This work involved liaison with CABE, the Government department responsible for ensuring the quality of architecture on sensitive sites.

In early March we reached a position where the planning officers felt able to take our application to build a new cinema to the planning committee with a recommendation for approval.

Our preparation work had involved a detailed structural and occupational demand survey on the Piano Building, which demonstrated it to be in a very poor structural condition, and not capable of economic refurbishment and re-use.

What most people will probably be unaware of is that English Heritage had three previous opportunities to list the Piano Building in 1996, 1999 and 2000.

None of these earlier opportunities was taken. Indeed, at one stage National Heritage wrote: "The Minister has carefully considered all the evidence and has concluded that the Brintons main office building merits listing, but he does not consider that the remainder of the buildings on the Brintons site are of sufficient interest, either architecturally or historically, to merit inclusion on the list."

Due to the actions of a minority group our plans for a cinema have now received a serious setback culminating in the listing, in the past few weeks, of the Piano Building.

The building has now become a liability to both the scheme and the town and, potentially, could sit for several years continuing to deteriorate in the centre of what will otherwise be an outstanding new town centre development.

Economics must play a part in the preservation of the past. Someone has to pay and a building will only be refurbished if it can be put to an economic use on completion of the works.

We are prepared to invest more time, effort and money into attempting to secure a cinema, which will be a long-term attribute to Kidderminster and something for the whole town to utilise and be proud of.