Sunday 30 December 2012

Public space

The Shard

"Renzo Piano's creation, the tallest building in western Europe, finally opens its 69th-floor viewing platform to the public – at £25 a ticket. What does that buy you? Digital telescopes, jokey panels sending up famous London dwellers (George Orwell installing CCTV cameras, Karl Marx and Margaret Thatcher on a tandem), and of course views stretching for 40 miles."

We have learnt a thing or two in the past several decades. Owen Luder's now demolished, much reviled, and featured in Get Carter Gateshead Trinity Square carpark included a restaurant on the top - which was never used, because of technical problems and a lack of commercial interest.