Signs of trouble ahead for Glasgow's buildings

The Herald Scotland

3 days ago

This is good news for several reasons. It protects a piece of historic architecture in a part of Glasgow – Possilpark – that's seen a lot of change, decline and neglect. It also recognises that, while the Vogue may not be the finest building ever, it is one of the last examples of architect James McKissack's work in cinemas in the 1930s and that makes it worthy of preserving. And perhaps most importantly, it means that if the owners want to develop the site, and it appears they do, they will have to incorporate the original cinema into their plans.
That this is possible – keeping the cinema and developing the site at the same time – is beyond doubt, as the architect Alan Dunlop demonstrated when he prepared drawings outlining how it could be done. Mr Dunlop's suggestions show how you can combine something like an art deco cinema with something more modern and come up with a design that's practical and aesthetically pleasing. Old and new, working together. All good stuff.
But even if we assume the Vogue has now been saved and will survive in some form, it's worth digging into the details of the ruling for it's in there that we find the signs of danger. The ruling was made by Alasdair Edwards, a reporter appointed by the government, and he essentially agrees with the decision of Historic Environment Scotland (HES) that the cinema is of special architectural or historic interest and should be listed. He does point out, in the euphemistic language of such reports, that the building has been subject to 'unsympathetic modifications' – it's a mess basically – but fortunately he can see beyond that to the building underneath, the building that's still there and is worth saving.
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The problems and signs of danger arise when he examines how we got to this point. Basically what happened is that the council originally granted a warrant to demolish the building and the owners went ahead and started. A member of the public then raised the alarm but HES said they wouldn't list the building because the council had issued the demolition warrant. As outrage grew, the council then appeared to have a change of heart and issued a building preservation order and HES restarted their process and decided second time around that the building should be listed after all.
Mr Edwards is highly critical of all this in his report and rightly so. The owners of the Vogue argued at the original hearing that two different, inconsistent decisions were made by HES on the same facts which was unfair and the reporter has effectively agreed with that. Mr Edwards says in his report that HES did not explain its rationale for changing the decision on listing the Vogue which was 'unsatisfactory'. He also says the transparency of the decision-making was 'less than satisfactory'. Unsatisfactory. Less than satisfactory. All euphemisms for bad.
The behaviour of the council was even worse. What emerged from the hearing is that there were no inspections, no checks and no real questions asked by the council before they issued the original permission to demolish the Vogue. It also looks like there was no system for council departments to properly talk to each other: building control, who issue the demolition warrants, did not communicate with planning, who are in charge of conservation, so no discussion took place on whether there were issues with the cinema that the council should be looking into.
The Vogue (Image: Newsquest)
Mr Edwards was not impressed by this. The fact, he said, that there was no formal communication between council staff regarding the application for demolition of the building was 'peculiar' (another of his euphemisms). He also said the lack of communication within the council meant a substantial amount of the building was removed, including features of architectural interest. In language more restrained than I would use, he concluded HES and the council 'could have handled the listing process better'.
The real danger here – specifically for other buildings at risk – is that HES and the council don't act on the ruling and make the process better. In the case of HES, they appear to have refused to list the building the first time round because there was a demolition order in place which is the wrong way round. HES should be making its decisions on the merits of the buildings – either it's worth listing or it isn't – and should be communicating their decisions clearly and consistently. As for the council, it needs to have a serious look at its procedures and improve the communication between Building Standards and Planning. If the council had been more proactive in serving a preservation notice when the owners first applied to demolish the Vogue, this whole debacle might have been avoided.
Having said all that, we do at least have a ruling that the Vogue must be preserved, which is great; as Mr Dunlop points out, any other decision would create a perverse incentive for owners to unilaterally demolish buildings before HES can carry out its assessments. But what we really need is a system that's robust and focused on protecting Glasgow's buildings. It's not about stopping development or even some demolition (some buildings have to come down). But it is about recognising that we nearly lost the Vogue because the current system is incoherent, inconsistent, confused and ineffective. So the next step is to fix it, before the next case comes along, and we end up with another pile of rubble.