The Waterfront Edinburgh Partnership – a joint venture between Edinburgh City Council, Lothian and Edinburgh Enterprise and Scottish Homes – this week appointed Llewelyn-Davies to develop CZWG/EDAW’s “concept” masterplan for the 8 mile coastal strip along the Firth of Forth. The regeneration scheme, which has been awarded £7m of Estates Renewal Challenge Funding by the Scottish Office, is expected to generate £500m of new development over 10 years.
Llewelyn-Davies was appointed ahead of CZWG/EDAW after competitive interviews. It also beat engineer Halcrow Fox and US architect Koetter Kim & Associates to the full masterplanning commission. It is understood that London-based Llewelyn-Davies offered to set up an office in Edinburgh to run the project.
EDAW did a strategic overview of the development potential of the waterfront in 1995. In May 1998, it was appointed with CZWG to design a concept masterplan for a new neighbourhood in the former industrial area.
The team proposed a new urban village, including a large residential element, a business park and a marina lined with small-scale leisure and retail units. Llewelyn-Davies will now design the next level of detail in the masterplan, including the envelope of the buildings and the streetplans.
CZWG co-founder Piers Gough said he was bitterly disappointed to have lost the commission. “We are very sorry not to be doing it because we thought we did a particularly good scheme. We were given the impression by the committee that the fact that we had been underbid by tens of thousands of pounds was pertinent.” Another source on the EDAW/CZWG team said cost was a key factor in the brief. “We did not lose it on quality. It was a cost issue,” he said.
Alan Cooper, director of special projects at Edinburgh City Council, said all the bids had been subjected to the council’s formal system of appraisal, based 40% on cost and 60% on quality.
But he added: “Cost is checked first and marks awarded for it. Then a thorough quality assessment goes on.” Llewelyn-Davies will submit a draft masterplan to the council’s planning committee in November. After three months of public consultation, a final masterplan will be drawn up by March 2000. If approved, it will be adopted as statutory supplementary planning guidance.
EDAW has been appointed to design a masterplan for the 121 ha centre of Telford, the 30-year-old Shropshire new town, by English Partnerships and major landowner Universities Superannuation Scheme.
