GOODBYE, PICCADILLY?
prise to develop it piecemeal? • In this week's article on the Piccadilly affair, Bernard Levin refers to the building which was to have arisen (and will arise, if permission is granted) on the Monico site as 'a misshapen monster.'
Important though the aesthetic argument is, it might not stand up on its own. The designers can_ argue that it was not their intention to cater for aesthetes: they can use the same defence of their designs as the commercial television companies use•of their programmes : that they give the public what it wants—garishness. And no doubt they will carry this argument farther, using it against the idea that the Circus should be reconstructed to a comprehensive plan. Nevertheless, the double argument is telling. Here is a wonderful oppor- tunity to redesign a notorious ugly-spot in the centre of London in such a way that catering for the needs of the traffic need not mean, as it so often does, despoiling the face of' the city; its looks and its character will actually be enhanced. It will be a sad day for London if the comprehensive planning proposal is defeated., But at this stage, the issues are not simply whether the projected building on the Monico site is a monstrOsity or an ingenious attempt to keep Piccadilly Circus in character; and whether the site should, or should not, be developed as a whole. As Mr. Levin points out, 'it is more im- portant to trace the steps by which the present situation was reached, for some of them are dis- turbing, and many of them strange.' The story he unfolds of the events that have led up to the forth-,, coming inquiry is indeed disturbing; because it reveals how little public opinion is able to express itself.
What happens to Piccadilly is of vital interest to Londoners, as well as being of sentimental concern to Britons the world over. It might con- sequently have been thought that the London County Council would have taken steps to ensure that plans for its future would be given the widest publicity long before they reached the present stage. But so far from trying to publicise the negotiations, the whole tendency appears to have been to try to cover them up. It is only a few months since the very interesting plans for com- prehensive development were put out, as if the LCC seriously contemplated acting on them. Yet as Mr. Levin shows, the LCC had already virtually committed itself to the erection of a building on the Monico site which, apart altogether from its aesthetic deficiencies, made nonsense of the com- prehensive plan.
The present inquiry should not, therefore, con- fine itself to examining the testhetic arguments— 'though it is good news that the Civic Trust has at last been prodded into action—or the practical issue of comprehensive versus piecemeal develop- ment, important though these are. It should also investigate whether bureaucratic indifference or deliberate deception has been used to keep the public ill-informed; and it should suggest ways in which we can be protected from such treatment in the future.
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