Edinburgh’s ‘Sydney Opera House’ looks further off than ever – Brian Ferguson

The proposed replacement for the Ross Bandstand in Edinburgh’s Princes Street Gardens is facing a growing number of questions, writes Brian Ferguson.

Critis say the Quaich Project to redevelop the Ross Bandstand would amount to "overdevelopment" of the Gardens

Just short of two and a half years have passed since Edinburgh unveiled the winning design after an international competition to choose a replacement for its historic, but unloved, Ross Bandstand. It seems bizarre now to recall that there had hardly been a hint of controversy over the prospect of a new concert venue in Princes Street Gardens. Back then, major events were largely limited to the end-of-festival fireworks concert and the Hogmanay celebrations. Gone were the days when major pop and rock concerts were staged there and only a handful of free events remained – a far cry from the venue’s heyday.

Quite simply, the bandstand, its facilities and the concrete bowl looking on to the stage had long since passed their sell-by date. Two cancellations of the Hogmanay gig in the space of four years had prompted the first serious look at trying to refurbish or replace the current bandstand since it was created in 1935. But hopes of a new venue came to nothing.

Five years ago I was approached by Norman Springford, the former owner of Edinburgh Playhouse, to pitch his vision of overhauling the gardens and creating a new arena in the park. He harboured big ambitions for Edinburgh to end up with something as iconic as Sydney Opera House or Bilbao’s Guggenheim museum. He was offering to stump up several million pounds to help pay for it, and even put together a taskforce to make it happen. When the winning design was announced in August 2017 its vision was almost universally applauded. Such was the momentum that had been built up and confidence of Mr Springford that he was predicting that construction work would begin the following year and be complete by 2019.

Perhaps naively, with the benefit of hindsight, I could not have predicted the problems that his vision, now known as the Quaich Project, would run into. The return of major pop and rock concerts to the gardens in the summer of 2018 and the controversy over blackout barriers and the level of infrastructure in the public space have done no favours to the project. Critics of the use of the gardens for commercial events have railed against the amount of infrastructure required for a single Hogmanay concert.

The prolonged controversy over the city’s Christmas market – particularly over why clearly sensitive decisions were taken behind closed doors – has heightened scrutiny and suspicions about the Quaich Project, against a growing backdrop of concern from heritage and community groups about the impact of over-
tourism, the commercialisation of public spaces and “festivalisation”.

All of the above explains why there has been something of a frenzied response to the leak of brochures for the fundraising campaign, which is tasked with raising almost £20 million to bring Mr Springford’s vision to reality.

But the tone and language of the campaign literature, and its promises of “marketing potential,” “brand profile”, and “sponsorship activation” was clearly going to attract the ire of critics. They should also have set alarm bells ringing in the City Chambers – if they ever reached the desks of elected politicians responsible for the gardens. At the time of writing, no-one has admitted signing off the campaign material.

The fact that a fundraising campaign is even underway for a project that does not yet have planning permission leaves the council and the Quaich Project facing a growing mountain of questions. With such a vast funding gap still to bridge, the prospect of Mr Springford’s vision becoming reality looks further away than ever.