Piccadilly Gardens...

Piccadilly Gardens are a very controversial part of the city. They were once a beautiful sunken garden with colourful flowerbeds with a fountain at the centre. Back in the early noughties they had a makeover and people have never been happy with them since.

The reasons are myriad. One third of the was built on to provide us with an iconic office building. It's the one you can see in the picture. Make your own mind up about its iconic status. A curving concrete wall separates it from the tram station and the bus station. It is grassed and is regularly churned to mud by the millions of pairs of feet that use it every year. It attracts some of the more interesting people who live in the city. Interesting smells perfume the air and people use the damaged benches for some alfresco drinking. It's all close to Piccadilly Station and creates a dreadful first impression of the city. Some councillors say it is successful but, in my opinion, it's just busy.

Because of the number of complaints and a campaign by the MEN, the council has been forced to do some improvements and clean the space up. The latest thing to have happened is the fountain has stopped working. I like fountains but I have never liked this one and over the years bits have stopped working. Last winter they installed coloured lights under the jets which looked trashy. But now it's completely given up the ghost. No one is sure why but the installation of a huge ferris wheel over part of the fountain and the mechanism that works it may have something to do with it.

Neither fountain or Ferris wheel have worked since April. The council have now decided to turn the fountain into a flowerbed and the Ferris wheel will turn again until April 2015 when some decision will be made about what to do.

Personally I hope they don't do anything with this fountain. It's throwing more good money after bad. What needs to be done is to have an international competition, like happened in St. Peter's Square which is shaping up nicely, and start from scratch.