Ballot Archives - Aberdeen Voice

“Universal Idiot”

Jun 172016

A parody of the Buffy Saint Marie song ‘Universal Soldier’ covered by Donovan. By Tom Shepherd.

He’s unrepentant, he’s shameless, deceitful, insane,
A betrayer of both you and me.
An he knows he shouldn’t win
But each ballot makes him grin,
Like a shark smelling drops of blood in the sea.

And he’s lying for religion,
He’s lying for greed,
He’s lying for his knighthood one day,
And he’s lying for the left,
And he’s lying for right,
And he thinks he’s doing right by us this way.

But without him
How would corporations fight their private wars?
Without him one percent would stand exposed.
He’ll sacrifice his soul
A stuffed ballot box his goal,
He’ll say his way’s the only way to go.

He’s the Universal Idiot and he’s dedicated to
Selling us the lies he’s paid to tell today,
He holds us in contempt and at arms length
But for those with open eyes
We’ve got find ourselves a better way.

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Ten Reasons To Vote Retain Union Terrace Gardens

Aberdeen City, Articles, Community, Environment, Featured, Information, Opinion No Responses »

Feb 242012

By Mike Shepherd.

The polling cards are out for the Union Terrace Gardens referendum and you have until March 1 to vote. The hype means you’ll have been bombarded with leaflets, pamphlets, news items and radio adverts.
If ‘connectivity’, a ‘21st century contemporary garden’, or ‘street-level access’ are key factors in deciding your vote, look no further; vote for the City Garden Project.

If you are undecided or swithering then read these very good reasons for voting to retain Union Terrace Gardens.

1. Your vote will preserve the look and feel of the Granite City. Union Terrace Gardens are an integral part of the heritage of Aberdeen. Planned by the same architects who designed the Art Gallery and the frontage of Marischal College, they show an architectural harmony in the city centre which would be destroyed by a modernistic City Garden.

2. Your vote will not result in a ghastly modern structure replacing our park. Although described as the City Garden, it is in fact a mixture of buildings, flyovers, underpasses and parkland. The design has a passing resemblance to 1960s-style new town architecture. At one public meeting, someone said that the underpasses in particular were likely to end up as urban no-go areas. I have even heard a supporter of the scheme conceding that it will look dated after about five to ten years.

3. Your vote will stop a multitude of new glass box office blocks being built in the city centre. Council documents show that consideration has been given to plans to build a central business district in the city centre and encourage office block construction. The building of the City Garden Project, “will encourage development in the city centre sooner, and on a bigger scale, than might otherwise be the case without public investment in enabling infrastructure.”

4. Your vote will improve our much-loved park. Jimmy Milne, oilman and MD of Balmoral Group, has said:

“I and many of my business contemporaries, are committed to establishing a fund which will help bring the gardens back to their former glory. Without destroying our heritage, and without putting Aberdeen City further into debt, it would not be difficult to breathe fresh life into the park. Improved access, new planting, cleaning and restoration, park wardens and live events could all be relatively easily and cost effectively achieved.”

5. Your vote will ensure that the mature trees in Union Terrace Gardens will be saved. All 77 trees will be kept, including the twelve elms, some of which are at least 200 years old.

6. Your vote will stop our Council borrowing £70m they can’t afford. Aberdeen City Council, £562m in debt, is being asked to borrow £70m through a risky tax scheme to help fund the City Garden Project. If there is insufficient money to pay back the loan, Council funds will be required to service it.

7. Your vote will avoid significant disruption and pollution in the city centre for the near three years it will take to build the scheme. The technical feasibility study for the project estimates that the equivalent of 3,947 dump trucks of earth and 4,605 dump trucks of granite will be excavated from the Gardens causing ‘large environmental impacts from noise, transport, dust and energy use.’

8. Your vote will avoid the major traffic problems caused by the movement of heavy lifting equipment, dumper trucks and lorries in and out of the city centre. It is estimated that the City Garden will take almost three years to build. It is likely that there will be major traffic problems in the city for much of this time. City centre business will be impacted by this and may never recover.

9. Your vote will avoid much, if not all, of the Council’s cultural activities being displaced to the underground building in the City Garden. The council funds institutions occupying cosy, intimate venues such as the Music Hall, Lemon Tree and Belmont Cinema. A review of council-funded cultural activities will be made with a view to possible relocation to the underground concourse.

10. Your vote will avoid any consideration that the future of the HM Theatre could be in doubt. Two major performance venues will be built in the City Garden only yards from HM Theatre. Councillors have asked if this will have an impact on the future of HM Theatre. No specific assurances have been given.

Aberdeen could change forever if the City Garden is built, and probably not for the better.

We have the chance to keep the leafy, green heart of the Granite City.

VOTE: RETAIN UNION TERRACE GARDENS

Build It And They Might Come – Tourism And The Fate Of UTG

Aberdeen City, Articles, Environment, Featured, Information, News, Opinion No Responses »

Jan 062012

Over three years ago, Sir Ian Wood announced the City Square Project with the intention of replacing Union Terrace Gardens with “a cross between the Grand Italian Piazza and a mini Central Park.” It has since been renamed the City Garden Project. The cost of building the project is nominally £140 million, of which it has been proposed that £70M of this would be borrowed by Aberdeen City Council involving a tax scheme. Mike Shepherd offers some analysis of current local government trends, the recession, and what it may mean for Aberdeen.

So what is the justification being put forward for this expensive project, a project that has caused so much controversy since it was announced?

The project’s supporters allege the City Garden Project is needed to ensure that Aberdeen is attractive enough to retain energy professionals long term and to ensure Aberdeen’s economy is based on tourism post-oil.

For instance, an advert by ACSEF in the Press and Journal (January 2010) stated that:-

“Creating a new heart for Aberdeen presents a unique opportunity to put the city on the ‘must visit’ list.”

Aberdeen City Council is £562 million in debt (2010 figure).
See: http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2011/02/21143624/4

Last November, Perth and Kinross Council approved demolishing the listed Perth Town Hall to build a Civic Square in its place, a move that has raised much controversy. The BBC reported:

“The council said many local businesses supported the civic square proposal. And council officers have argued that full demolition and reuse of the site as a public space would provide the most additional value to the local economy. The cost of scheme is estimated at £4.4m, but the report said an additional 15,000 people per year would extend their stay in the city, with an extra 60,000 coming for events. “This would result in a combined additional spend per person per visit of £23 generating a total gross expenditure of £1.65m per annum,” it added.
See:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-tayside-central-15742937

Perth and Kinross Council is £222 Million in debt (2010 figure).

A similar controversy has been raging in Cork, Ireland, where the struggling Cork Council has been involved in a plan to install the Sky Garden Project. Celebrity TV gardener Diarmuid Gavin’s Irish Sky Garden won the gold medal at the Chelsea Flower Show (It looks like a giant hanging flower basket).

There is a pattern here. Local governments the world over are in serious debt

The Council agreed to put the garden on permanent display in the city’s Fitzgerald Park at a cost of at least €300,000, with more than €1.7 million given to the project by Fáilte Ireland, the Irish tourism body.

In tones, redolent of the Aberdeen controversy, the Irish Independent wrote:

“THE taxpayer could be hit with a further bill of over €100,000 in costs connected to Diarmuid Gavin’s award-winning garden.

“Workers’ Party councillor Ted Tynan said the council needed to clarify precisely how much the garden cost, and what the council would pay in transport, insurance and operating costs. He also expressed disbelief that the garden — including its 30-metre high floating ‘pod’ and crane — may only open for three months each year.

“I love gardens and flowers and parks, but this is absolutely ridiculous. You’d put a hell of a lot of flower beds around the city for this kind of money. We should keep our feet on the ground not in the clouds with a sky garden’,” Mr Tynan said

“There are 500 boarded-up council houses in Cork and 120 people with various disabilities waiting on home adaptations. But the funding to go to all this has been cut by central government,” he added.

“Last night, the council said support for the “iconic garden” was in line with the policy that led to the creation of successful visitor attractions in the city.”

“This is part of a long-term policy to create a necklace of top tourist attractions that will bring people to Cork, get them to stay longer here and spend more money here,” a council spokesman said.

“Fáilte Ireland insisted that the garden would generate significant tourism earnings.”

See: http://www.independent.ie/national-news/diarmuid-gavinrsquos-euro2m-lsquosky-gardenrsquo-growing-in-cost-2661548.html

There is a pattern here. Local governments the world over are in serious debt. Services and amenities are being cut, yet it doesn’t stop them from spending money on expensive big-ticket items that might bring visitors in. There is a feedback loop between local government, chambers of commerce and national government that serves to create the syndrome, “if we build it, they will come”.

While a worthy cause, this has caused controversy as the annual budget will be part-funded by the city’s Common Good Fund

Where local economies have failed as in Cork for example, tourism may be the last throw of the dice to engender outside income. There will be much competition for the dwindling number of international tourists as the recession bites. Recent reports suggest that countries such as Greece and Spain will focus relentlessly on promoting tourism as the last glimmer of light in their busted economies.

Aberdeen has caught up on the trend of pushing long-term tourism. The local chamber of commerce have been promoting a new destination marketing organisation for the city called ‘Visit Aberdeen’.

While a worthy cause, this has caused controversy as the annual budget will be part-funded by the city’s Common Good Fund; £107,000 for 2011 / 2012 and potentially for the next six years also. Arguably this is more ‘commerce good’ than ‘common good’.

The draft business plan recognises the future of the City Garden Project / Union Terrace Gardens as a primary issue. It is to be hoped that an organisation part-funded by Common Good money will not be promoting the controversial development of a public park that lies on Common Good land.
See: http://committees.aberdeencity.gov.uk/mgConvert2PDF.aspx?ID=15678

Are the citizens of Aberdeen willing to support the allocation of scarce resources to “a build it and they might come” vision for the city, allowing a public park to be developed for the sake of possible future tourists? Or is this all pie in the sky stuff that will use up money desperately needed elsewhere and will result in the appearance of the Granite City changing forever?

You have the chance to decide yourself. The referendum on the fate of Union Terrace Gardens will be held in February.

Union Treeless Gardens

Aberdeen City, Articles, Community, Featured, Information, Opinion No Responses »

Dec 292011

By Mike Shepherd.

The jury for the City Garden Project will announce the final scheme for the proposed development of Union Terrace Gardens sometime in January. The choice will be between two designs, one with a web-based motif and the other with a big glass building in the middle which looks like a giant worm.

It is clear from both designs that most of the existing trees will be removed to build the new ‘garden’, whichever is built.

New trees could of course be planted, but it would be decades before these grew to a comparable size, and this may not even be possible in those areas with a shallow concrete substrate. There will be claims that some of the smaller trees could be replanted, although the practicalities of this are obvious.

The big trees are particularly important as they absorb carbon and filter more pollution from the air compared to smaller trees. One study concluded that for this purpose:

“Big trees, the ones the Victorians planted for us, are what we need to maintain, but they are few and far between.”
See: http://www.theecologist.org

This week saw the shocking news that people living in Scottish cities are being exposed to dangerously high levels of pollutants. A WWF Scotland report identified three pollution hotspots in Aberdeen; Union Street, Market Street, and Wellington Road. These show levels that are in breach of EU targets intended to protect human health. The main problem is the high levels of nitrogen dioxide caused by traffic fumes.
See: http://www.pressandjournal.co.uk

Aberdeen has a highly-polluted city centre. The solution to the problem would be to reduce the level of traffic in the city centre; pedestrianising Union Street has been suggested as an option.

It is also clear that we need to maintain the tree population of the city centre to help absorb the pollution. The key areas are Bon Accord Gardens, St. Nicholas churchyard and Union Terrace Gardens itself. Otherwise, Aberdeen city centre can hardly be described as awash with trees.

Yet, the proposed City Garden Project will remove a population of mature trees from the city centre. The problem is acknowledged in the Technical Feasibility Study for the project.

“Removal of mature trees and existing ecological habitat; 78 mature trees would be lost including 17 number mature Elm trees. The ecological value of these trees would take decades to replace as many of the trees are up to 200 years old.”

The City Garden Project will itself be a major source of pollution while it is being built (for the duration of almost two and a half years according to the same study).

“Excavation of rock/earth; It is anticipated that 30,000m3 of earth and 35,000m3 of granite will need to be removed from site. This which will cause large environmental impacts from noise, dust, transport and energy use. The removal of this volume of material is equivalent to approximately 3,947 dump trucks of earth and 4,605 dump trucks or more of granite to be removed from site or re-used where possible on site. This would have large environmental and social impacts on the local area and community surrounding the gardens.”
See: http://www.acsef.co.uk

It is clear from this, that the ecological downside of building the City Garden Project is substantial. The construction phase will see a protracted period of dirt and pollution in the city centre. By contrast, it is no exaggeration to describe Union Terrace Gardens as the green, living heart of the Granite City; its big trees acting as a natural washing machine, helping to keep us healthy by removing noxious pollution.

Those living in Aberdeen City will receive a postal ballot in mid February allowing them to decide between retaining Union Terrace Gardens or sanctioning the construction of the City Garden Project.

I will vote to retain Union Terrace Gardens.

Union Terrace Gardens Referendum Going Ahead

Aberdeen City, Articles, Community, Featured, Information No Responses »

Dec 152011

By Mike Shepherd.

On Wednesday, Councillors approved to proceed with a referendum on the fate of Union Terrace Gardens.
After the heated negotiations over the referendum question, as reported in last week’s Aberdeen Voice, the question suggested by the Friends of UTG was eventually considered as appropriate.

The poll is to be completed by March 1st 2012, and the result is expected on March 2nd.

The question to be asked is as follows:

“You are being asked to choose between retaining Union Terrace Gardens or replacing them with the proposed City Garden Project design. (Please read the voter information pack before you vote to make sure that you understand what is meant by “retaining Union Terrace Gardens” and “the proposed City Garden Project design”.)

Which option do you support? (Please mark a cross in the box beside your choice.)

Retaining Union Terrace Gardens.

The City Garden Project design.”

The referendum will involve a postal ballot, although the possibility of internet voting is being looked at. Voting packs will be issued around Thursday 16th February 2012 and ballot papers must be returned not later than 5.00 pm on Thursday 1st March 2012.

Those entitled to vote at this referendum will be those listed in the Electoral Register as local government electors at a qualifying address within the Aberdeen area, and who will have attained the age of 18 on or before 30th November 2012.

This means that those currently under the age of 18 but who are entitled to be included in the register in force until November 2012 with a qualifying date against their names will be entitled to vote in the referendum.

Qualified voters who are not yet on the register and who wish to vote in the referendum must apply to the Electoral Registration Officer at Woodhill House, Westburn Road,Aberdeen AB16 5GE. Applications must arrive not later than 5.00 pm on Tuesday 10th January 2012.

The poll will be organised by an independent administrator, Crawford Langley. Crawford comes highly recommended by those who have worked with him before. He will be responsible for the content of the voting packs to be sent to the electors, including the ballot paper, the counting officer’s statement relating to the referendum, the voter identifier, and statements from any campaigning organisations.

Councillors discussed whether the referendum should be binding or not. There are legal issues that mean the referendum strictly can’t be binding. However, in practice it will be effectively binding, as Sir Ian Wood has stated that he will withdraw funding for the project if the public reject it. The Scottish Government have also stated that they will not lend money to the Council if the public do not support it.

On March 2nd 2012 the fate of Union Terrace Gardens will be known. The people will at last be allowed to decide what they want their city centre to look like.

Union Terrace Gardens Update

Aberdeen City, Articles, Community, Environment, Featured, Information No Responses »

Nov 042011

By Mike Shepherd.

The design competition for the City Garden Project has just finished at the Pier in Belmont Street and the organisers say that about 15,000 have visited to see the six designs on display.

The Friends of Union Terrace Gardens canvassed outside the exhibition for the entire three weeks it lasted.

We managed to speak to many of the public as they came out and we asked them their opinion. Probably between 10 and 20% liked the designs and at least a half felt uncomfortable with them. Many had spoiled the ballots, particularly as the option to keep the existing gardens had not been included.

Of those that voted, option two (the one with the worm-like greenhouse over the middle of the railway) was preferred as it was seen as the least damaging. A couple of architects told us that this was probably the Norman Foster design. Our general impression is that the Aberdeen public were underwhelmed by the designs, more the woe factor than the wow factor.

I’m not sure it was made plain to those taking part that their vote was merely serving to give an indication to a jury who would actually make the final choice, not them. The jury includes Sir Ian Wood. The jury will come to a decision sometime later in the month.

Option two “the worm” is likely to be a forerunner. The bumph describes it as “Protecting the gardens, transforming the setting”. For some, it has a close resemblance to the Millennium option, which largely preserved the gardens but decked over the road and railway. The Millennium option was proposed for a lottery funded project in the late 1990s but was passed over.

However, option two does change the gardens despite appearances to the contrary.

The balustrades are removed on the theatre side with a wide series of steps leading down to a circular amphitheatre below. The famous crest disappears. On the Union Bridge side, the gardens ramp up to street level. It is clear that many of the trees will be removed.

There are early signs that the Friends of Union Terrace Gardens could be asked to compromise on this option given that it appears to be the least destructive. This will be an attempt to muddy the issue with the public.

However, our constitution is clear. A key aim is to “to campaign for the conservation and improvement of Union Terrace Gardens”. Option two does not conserve Union Terrace Gardens and we cannot support it.

Aberdeen City Council’s plan to use TIF for Union Terrace Gardens project will be progressed if public support for the project can be demonstrated.

The Scottish Government issued a press release on Tuesday about TIF funding. They have proposed six pilot projects whereby Scottish Councils will be allowed to borrow money for regeneration projects and capture the business rates generated to pay off the loan (Tax Incremental Financing).

Two have been approved and another in Glasgow is to be approved pending a local council vote.

Aberdeen was hoping to gain one of the three remaining slots but was unsuccessful. However, the Government did announce that “Aberdeen City Council’s plan to use TIF for Union Terrace Gardens project will be progressed if public support for the project can be demonstrated”.

So the Aberdeen submission did not appear to meet acceptance for one of the six cases on business merits, yet is being given preferential treatment if the public like it.

Behind the scenes, Aberdeen Council have been lobbying hard to get an award.

Given that £70M of public money is involved here, it is alarming that the money appears to have been promised on grounds other than objective business criteria.

This decision has overtones of what Americans call pork barrel politics:

“Pork barrel is a derogatory term referring to appropriation of government spending for localized projects secured solely or primarily to bring money to a representative’s district.” (Wikipedia).

The instance on demonstrating public support would appear to make a public referendum more likely. This is not supported by the City Garden Project team. One of their members told us:

“I don’t think we should have a referendum because the public is not sufficiently informed to make a sensible decision.”

An opinion poll would be their preferred option. The leader of the Council Callum McCaig disagrees. He told me in an email on Wednesday that:

“I’m quite clear that we need to have a referendum on the issue. Even the best opinion poll will come with a margin of error and if the result was close there would always be an element of doubt over the validity of the poll.

“Yes a referendum will not be cheap, but given the scale of the proposed investment, and the indication from the government that a clear demonstration of public support being required before they approve a TIF scheme, it is a price worth paying to have a definitive answer as to whether the public want this project to go ahead.“

The Council are currently investigating the options for running a referendum and a vote on this is due to take place later this month.

What would be the result in a referendum? Scottish Television gave an early indication when they ran a straw poll with over 1,100 taking part. Preserving Union Terrace Gardens was an option along with the six other city square designs. 74% voted to keep the Gardens.