My £19m plan will be better value for city, says Leicester Mayor Sir Peter Soulsby
Sir Peter Soulsby has said the £19 million he intends to use to transform Leicester city centre will have a greater benefit than the cash spent building the Curve theatre.
The city mayor said the cost of his Connecting Leicester vision, which includes more pedestrianisation and a new public square, was modest compared to the "vast sums" pumped into the flagship arts venue.
Sir Peter said: "Connecting Leicester's costs are £19 million, a large sum, but I think it is reasonable and it will have a much greater impact than the money that was spent on Curve.
"That was the most disastrously overspent project in the city council's history. In fact, disastrous is a mild way of describing how that project was managed.
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"There was no doubt there was a powerful case for the building of a new theatre but it was very badly managed.
"The initial cost of the project to the council was supposed to be £4.4 million, but in the end it spiralled to £36.8 million."
Press reports have quoted Sir Peter as saying Curve was the most disastrous project the city had seen but he clarified his position to the Mercury.
He said: "I am not critical of the finished product – Curve is a wonderful theatre – or its management, for whom I have nothing but great admiration. It is the way it was managed by the council at the time."
Curve opened to critical acclaim in late 2008 – a year behind schedule – with a final cost of £61 million – £35 million over budget.
Sir Peter added: "I am not sure it was put in the right place. It is a very constrained site and presented design difficulties and extra costs. It would have been worth spending time trying to find a larger site."
Councillor Ross Willmott, who was the Labour leader of the council when it embarked on the Curve project, said: "I think his comments are absurd. He should focus on his job running the city. It does no good talking down a project that has proved a success."
Coun Willmott said Curve's costs had escalated from original budgets, but he claimed that happened under the Liberal Democrat and Tory administration that succeeded his.
An Audit Commission report into the Curve project said the city council, which had been run by all three major political parties from the project's inception to its conclusion, was responsible for cost increases.
Coun Willmott said he supported Sir Peter's Connecting Leicester vision, which also includes pedestrianising more streets in the city centre and creating the new public square – Jubilee Square – in St Nicholas' Circle. He said: " like what he is proposing but don't see how comparing it to Curve serves a purpose."
Critics have questioned the expense of Connecting Leicester, which is under consultation.
Miguel D'Almeida, who runs a coffee shop in Guildhall Lane and is chairman of The Lanes Traders Association, said: "Jubilee Square is an expensive ego project for the mayor. By taking the car park out of St Nicholas' Circle he will take our trade away."
Comments
by leicesterblue
Wednesday, August 22 2012, 4:03PM
“Just bomb it take my word it will look better,at the moment its a dump compaired wth nottingham.”
by eyresmonsell
Wednesday, August 22 2012, 1:40PM
“£19 million for Sesame Street and petes park.
£600k for a few slabs in the market.
£500k extra for science park that is not even started.
Is this a case of substance abuse?”
by mitzubishi06
Monday, August 20 2012, 10:26PM
“save more money kick sir pete out”
by garyb2011
Monday, August 20 2012, 12:07PM
“le8man
You are pointing out the inconvenient truth that the Labout Party and SPS wish you to forget. This City has lacked true leadership and vision for decades and SPS has been at the core of it. He is unable to provide the skills required to make the really big decisions.
I think that the really big issue is that local government is slow and boring and politicians do not have the patience or skills to plan ahead. They cannot resist falling back on showpiece projects. You only have to look at the detail of SPS's new plan - it is simply a hotpotch of unconnected schemes stitched together under a meaningless strapline.
The City needs jobs. We are well placed geographically but constantly fail to attract enough investment. Our local leaders need to think long-term but as none of them have ever made, fixed or sold anything how can they really know what business is all about?”
by le8man
Monday, August 20 2012, 10:55AM
“by jaedgahuva
Saturday, August 18 2012, 12:27PM
"Whilst I don't visit them often; both Nottingham and Birmingham have some very nice, previously run down areas which have received investment to create things similar to what our supreme leader has proposed
-------------------------------------------
Both of these cities have had large investments made and created by the private sector. Birmingham, as it is the UK's second city and Nottingham as it is the Government centre for the East Mids. Hence they have been able to keep and retain the blue chip employer base that is vital to success. Regretfully Leicester has lost many over a long period of time, albeit we do have the likes of Next, Dunelm, Santander, - oh but they are all based in the County.
SPS and the previous incarnations of the Leicester City Labour Party and its various cabals, can only blame each other, they have been in continual power since late 70's, except for a 2 year blip when the LDS/Cons were in charge. Much of this time SPS was either Leader or now Mayor.
Questions which should be asked are where is the money coming from? How much will it cost taxpayers in total? - they don't appear to be answered or publicised.
Why can't the defunct Velodrome at Saffron Lane be redeveloped, instead of being sold for housing?
The Curve Theatre- a vanity project if ever there was one- wonder how many residents from within the City actually use it?
The residents and taxpayers of Leicester, need to take their heads out of the sand and start looking at what has been done in their name, and how much it has cost them, the missed opportunities, the lack of investment, the poor job opportunities etc etc
Welcome to "Red" Leicester!”
by jaedgahuva
Saturday, August 18 2012, 12:27PM
“Whilst I don't visit them often; both Nottingham and Birmingham have some very nice, previously run down areas which have received investment to create things similar to what our supreme leader has proposed. These were done in better economic times however, and both cities have more space to play with than Leicester.
Personally I would love the centre to be a more welcoming place to visit; I only ever go into town if I have a specific need to, and I don't live that far away. I would certainly never visit simply to enjoy the scenery or soak up the atmosphere!
It is a shed load of money to spending though, especially when things are as tough as they are. It's a gamble; in the short term it will create jobs. In the medium to long term, if the economy picks back up it will create further jobs and could be a great investment. If things go wrong however, well we've seen it all before haven't we?”
by zetta
Friday, August 17 2012, 9:53PM
“Fair enough i.e. the indoor market is 40 years old and is a blight on the city centre...... but the £4 million square is on top of a very recent investment..... but lets not chuck out the baby with the bath water , as the plan has some good + bad points”
by redcat
Friday, August 17 2012, 7:18PM
“But what Sir Peter is forgetting -or hoping WE will conveniently forget- is that the Curve was planned and given the go ahead at a time of economic prosperity, locally and nationally. Would it get the go-ahead under today's economic conditions? I very much doubt it! To decide to replace an old theatre with a shiny new one is fine at a time when there is money to spare, but pedestrianising roads and building new squares seems madness if it is done at the same time as vital public services are being cut. Wait until there is enough money in the kitty for public services and some left over, THEN we can go splashing out on a Jubilee square -if not it's like spending money on expensive Christmas presents when you are short of food...”
by mivoice1
Friday, August 17 2012, 1:45PM
“The real issue here is just how much residents of Leicesters opinions on theses issues matter to SPS and his team... and the answer is not at all...and the prove will out when we end up with three gyspy sites in LE4, A park at the end of the High Street that no one seems to want, a city with lovely pedestrian streets but no way to park close enough to the city...and the real laugh is as council tax payers we have no say on how our money is spent, in fact to cover this geat vision of his he intends to borrow the money so we can all pay that off later...if SPS was the talented visionary he claims to be then he really does need to start listening to the cities residents and stop riding rough shot over them.”
by LikeItaLot
Thursday, August 16 2012, 11:06PM
“by oldhenry
Thursday, August 16 2012, 7:28PM
."Well as an accountant and therefore a 'student' of economics I will tell you why the Mayor's vison is a wate of money.
There is no money in Leicester because there are few real jobs.Selling mobile phones to silly tennagers is not a way to run an economy as it is like runiing a country by cutting each other's hair. Thaink about it and you will see where teh problem lies. You need to create walth by creating products or services and selling them to others, preferably overseas as we have to buy so much from them2
vison = ?
wate = ?
tennagers = ?
runiing = ?
Thaink = ?
walth = ?
Good job you work with numbers and not words.”