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- Joined: Wed Jul 30, 2014 12:28 pm
Tue Nov 17, 2015 10:14 am
Simon__200 wrote:You can't really compare the scale of this with those huge projects though.
How long did it take them to fit out the Mailbox in Birmingham? That was basically a shopping mall refitted as a broadcasting centre. That's a closer comparison. Actually, the Birmingham move from the old Pebble Mill site, to a city centre site has many closer comparisons, not least the somewhat odd idea of moving from their own owned, comparatively much lower cost building, to one they have to lease from someone else at great expense. The old Pebble Mill shared much styling similarities to the Llandaff site too.
Salford is a much better comparison with Cardiff than Brum. Salford has 2,700 BBC staff. Central Square will have 1,200. In both Salford and Cardiff the main studio developments were developed seperately from the BBC HQ buildings - although the northern studios 'Media City Studios' are on an adjoining site.
The Mail Box move coincided with a major downgrade of production in Brum. It's basically a smallish part of a building that includes other offices, a hotel etc. It's actually a smaller centre than Bristol and not much bigger than places like Leeds and Newcastle. Pebble Mill was comparable to BH Llandaff - the Mail box really doesn't compare to Central Square. Even in Brum though, the building was completed in 2000 and the BBC centre went live in 2004.
Work on Pacific Quay in Glasgow - a very similar development started in 2004 and it opened in 2007. Poeple can argue as much as they want but that's how long these things take!
