Planners likely to approve a 23-storey apartment building in

Agreed. The smalltown minds of some city councillors, along with those locals who pine for the "old Cardiff", irk me greatly. The transformation the city has seen since the 90s almost certainly wouldn't have happened: no bay, no WMC, no stadium and no St. Davids. We would still be the parochial, post-industrial backwater we once were. The fact that we still are, to some extent, shows that there is much further to go.

Anyway, back to the topic at hand.

Cen, when he mentioned to the "highest building" I read it as referring to the highest tower of this particular development (ie. the 23 storey tower as opposed to the seven and eight floor blocks), but I could be wrong.

Frankly, I fear Coun. Iona Gordon is going to have a stroke when the 135m tower reachers the planning committee.

I'm off back to Dubai next week (just a holiday sadly), I might take her with me. There's a 25 floor office building gone up in the block I used to live in, it looks like a 4 floor building compared to it's neighbours. She'd have a heart attack !

It's fine to have that opinion of course, each to their own. What worries me more is our capital city has councillors that think 23 floors is tall, and in particular have an issue with 'tall' buildings in a city centre. Go visit some other countries please, or in fact just go to London and have a good look around.

Interestingly though, another councillors says this:

But Coun Garry Hunt, Labour councillor for Llanishen said: “I love urban landscapes and the clumping of high buildings. I think this area is starting to scrub up very nicely, and if the designs of the highest building is as described, it’s quite impressive and I like it very much.”

Do you think the "highest building" he refers to is the Watkin Jones tower? If so then maybe it will end up passing planning just fine.

I think he might be referring to the 23 storey tower as there are two other buildings of 6 and 8 stories. the Watkins Jones tower is over the road from the Golden Cross. If JR Smart also have the other triangle shaped plot of land the other side of the track as Cambo has alluded to, then I reckon they will want to put something equally as tall there to create some sort of continuity.

According to Wales Online, JR Smart won't be developing this scheme. Apparently they will be inviting residential developers to bid for it. I'm not sure whether this is good news or bad news. On one hand, if a wealthy company come in for it, it will be of good quality. On the other hand, it could be left in the wrong hands, or may never even start.

here here are some pics of the proposed building

That's better than the initial design isn't it ?

It doesn't quite say if they'll still own it when they involve housebuilders. Is it going to be a partnership maybe ?

I hope they get through that process fairly quickly. They sold their student housing plots in phase 1 of Capital Quarter ages ago and the new owners of the plots still haven't started (although hopefully they will soon). I hope a start happens in the next 6 months.