Knab Site

[tooney1]

 

• Multi-purpose use 'educational' hub with 'affordable' rent space for those in the creative industries, such as artists' living/studio spaces, chill-out rooms for yoga and pilates, community coffee room with an inter-active interpretative centre.

 

 

I like this option, though it should be fully publicly funded, never turn a profit, and take at least a century to break-even.

[Ghostrider]

I would like an ice rink. No, seriously I would!

Don't give them ideas, if the SIC ran with that it would end up with the Clickimin Loch being frozen, and roofed over with another great white whale of a tent.

Edited July 27, 2017 by Ghostrider

[Guest tiodylb17]

Holiday accommodation aimed at the budget traveller, bike hire facility, bar/café, pick up drop off for tours etc..........

[Urabug]

Well I would suggest the provision of another camp/caravan site .

 

Sure this could be provided no problem as many of the services required probably  already exist. 

[Da Burra Shop]

We still don't know if anyone has enquired of the landowner what they want to do with the land, at the moment it is on free lease for educational purposes, if not used for education then it may well cost a fortune before a turf is turned.

[Twerto]

We still don't know if anyone has enquired of the landowner what they want to do with the land, at the moment it is on free lease for educational purposes, if not used for education then it may well cost a fortune before a turf is turned.

It turns out only a small part of it it falls under education. (i.e the now English block and the land down to Twageos) I am lead to believe that most of it is owned by SLAP and the rest is owned by the Council.

[Ghostrider]

^ Good. SLAP and the SIC can get their heads together again and cook up a scheme, which they seem awfully good at, to get together with the NHS, which they're getting increasingly good at, to trade the existing hospital site for a new modern PFI hospital on their bits of the AHS site and refurb/convert the existing hospital building in to flats. Much better use for the hospital site, plenty of room to have a big enough hospital of optimal design on the AHS site, so everybody wins. Room too for plenty of parking, plus a chopper pad that could be used without any significant overflying of residential, which might stay in one place for more than five minutes.

 

Handy too for the NHS burying all their many mistakes, they can just pop them over the wall - the site's probably big enough for the NHS to create their own dedicated graveyard, but they'd probably not risk the negatIve PR from folk seeing how fast it filled up.

[suuusssiiieee]

I actually like the hospital idea - and look at the spanking new hospital going up in Kirkwall. They saw a need for a new build and get it done.

 

It goes without saying probably a decent idea but it will get dismissed out of hand

[magnie ii]

I actually like the hospital idea - and look at the spanking new hospital going up in Kirkwall. They saw a need for a new build and get it done.

 

It goes without saying probably a decent idea but it will get dismissed out of hand

surely access would be a problem with the roads out the knab a new hospital would need to be in a better spot for access not worse

[Ghostrider]

^ They'd be far from ideal, but compared to the current hospital access it would be paradise. It never was great there from day one, and with both increased traffic volume and hospital usage as the years have gone on its been an impossible nightmare for years.

 

It's the bigger picture you need to look at too though, if folk want the hospital to remain in the town, the AHS site is virtually the last chance saloon, unless you talk condemning one or more or the few left remaining grassed areas, a massive demolition project or filling in the Clickimin Loch.

 

GIve the NHS the Gibbie to tack on to Montfield, give them the play and flower parks in KHS, bulldoze 25% of Sandveien all could probably work, but folk might not agree. Otherwise, you're talking someplace like around the Observatory, the Decca or Gulberwick. Exposed hilltop sites like the first two are hardly the best locations for the sickest and weakest members of the population to have to congregate continuously, Gulberwick would be fine with me, and I wouldn't expect most other yokels would have too much problem with it there either, toonies though, maybe not so much.

[mogling]

What I would like to see part of the site used for {with a good view of the sea and the boats coming in & oot}

is well-designed, accessible council / Hjaltland / Housing Association housing for people with physical disabilities.

 

Considering the number of people that develop disabling long term conditions and

for many, their future housing needs, it would be fine to have some houses available

in a quiet area with a nice view.

 

{I was a carer for someone who was housebound, and all they ever wished for was a view

of the sea, and to be able to see boats. Their window looked out onto a brick wall...}

 

There could be some single-person houses, some for a small family, and some 4 bedroomed for

folk with a larger family.

 

A parking space at the door {On the lea side} and  a peerie bit of patio so folk could get outside

in their wheelchair to get a bit of sun on their face on the couple of summer days we get.

 

 

If there is indeed a clause requiring 'Educational links', then the housing could primarily

be for Teachers, lecturers, tutors or anyone who has ever worked in a school /canteen / College / Education dept,

or is tenuously related / connected to someone who has links to 'education'.

[suuusssiiieee]

As ever nothing is ever perfect in this life but as Ghostie refers there is now a chronic lack of available space left for any major projects in, around, or near Lerwick. It's bad enough that the last bastion of green space the Ness of Sound may one day have to be used for future Cemetery use (i can't think of another area within the Lerwick limits).

 

The old GBH is a costly beast to maintain, it's a huge drain on resources.

 

So Magnie ii if your saying for the sake of some access issues a new hospital is not really what you want to see on that site, well surely that would apply to anything that is constructed on that site. I get the Knab Road area isn't perfect but roads can be changed if needed, maybe get rid of some road humps first !!,  etc... 

 

For years the Orcadian's seriously lagged behind us on major infrastructure but how the pendulum has swung the other way. They in recent years have enjoyed getting a new High School, Library & Archives,  & Travel centre hub to name but a few and now the new hospital.

 

We just make do....

[Ghostrider]

Access issues to the AHS site could be vastly improved with a not particularly large road upgrade. Put a roundabout at the Sletts/Burgh Road/Scalloway Road/South Road crossroads and upgrade Breiwick Road and through between the old Cemetery and the Lighthouse Buildings, or if we're going to be looking at sacrificing green belt, send it up over the Knab from the Ronald Street junction to around where the skate park is to avoid the worst congested bits.

 

You'd need to sacrifice a house or two to open up the corners at the Sletts, but that was absolutely no problem when it had to be done to build the first swimming pool or get a roundabout and road in to the "cultural quarter" at the North Ness, regardless the opinion of the occupants of them. So, for something as important to everybody as a hospital, it surely should be a given.

[shetlander]

It goes without saying probably a decent idea but it will get dismissed out of hand

A good idea is all very well but unless the Health Board think the Knab is suitable for a new hospital and/or there's money on the table to provide one, putting it in a masterplan is a waste of time. The same goes for a new primary school or college.

 

Housing is the most realistic option for it IMO with maybe one of the listed buildings being used as a hotel or hostel. I like moglings suggestion about a more mixed/inclusive development with accommodation for disabled folk, old and young, private and public.

 

Depending on how greedy the SIC are going to be I'd have thought there's an opportunity for them to leverage in some public benefit as a condition of the sale - a requirement for a developer to put in (say) a new camp/caravan site.

 

Oh and we canna always be one ahead of Orkney - I'm sure we're still the envy of them in a lot of respects

[Ghostrider]

^ Do we really need more housing? Surely the proposed Staney Hll development(s) will swallow up a lot of demand, the AHS site has potential for, what do they reckon, 140, 170 or something like that, I don't remember exactly?

 

Likewise, if access was considered an issue when planning a new AHS on the site, and is being brought up again now with the suggestion of using it for a hospital, surely well over a hundred houses is going to generate much more traffic than either of them.

 

In all liklihood it wil mostly (all?) get turned over to houses, and if it does, while there's a lot of good in the idea of having a mixed public/private development, I'm less than sure existing attempts at this have been undertaken very well, and the idea needs a lot more thought than its been given so far.

 

A public/private mix seems to work pretty well where you have privately owned houses mixed in among public ones on streets/estates which were built as public housing and some have become privately owned under right to buy. Streets/estates planned that way from the start, not so much. Quoys very much gives the impression of being a few privately owned 'mansions' perched on a 'nob's hill' 'looking down' (both literally and metaphorically) on the plebs in their 'little boxes' stacked up and squeezed in like sardines in a tin - not saying that's how it is in practice for the people who live there, I'm just citing it as its probably the most well known, and to me, obvious example of a development which has been designed so as it inevitably looks that way.

Edited August 13, 2017 by Ghostrider