It’s twelve years since I last visited the transporter bridge: the longest extant transporter bridge in the world. It remains an astonishing sight, although in one crucial respect, it has changed beyond recognition.

For five years now, the Transporter has been out of service, becoming a monument more to modern underinvestment in infrastructure than early 20th century engineering. It looks like it might take investment of £30m to press it back into service.

Waiting for me dad, a sculpture by Mackenzie Thorpe, commemorates families waiting for the return of the workers across the bridge at the end of their shifts on the industrial sites beyond. As events transpired, it was unveiled about twelve weeks before the bridge ‘temporarily’ closed, which lends it a melancholic air to expectation it depicts: the figures will be waiting for far longer than they expected for anyone to return over the Tees.

You know how on QVC, there’s never a gadget that performs only one function? Everything has to be multi-purpose, even if some of those purposes are a little bit questionable? William Bell (1844-1919) was once Chief Architect of the North Eastern railway, and I reckon he’d have loved QVC.

By Middlesbrough Dock, there was a need for a simple accumulator tower: a big tower containing water to provide hydraulic pressure to operate things like lock gates. William Bell’s team were on it in 1903. They decided not only to make an accumulator tower, but also to whack a clock tower on top. Why not?

Well, because the local ironworks didn’t want workers clock-watching, that’s why not. But Bell’s team weren’t to be defeated: they simply installed three clock faces, and left the fourth face—in the direction of the ironworks—blank.

Where there’s a will, there’s a way…

In the North East, we seem to like saving odd bits of old buildings: consider the Doxford Arch, for example, or the sign from the Crown Works site. In that spirit, allow me to present to you the last remaining wall of the Cleveland Salt Works:

But how did we end up with a salt works in Middlesbrough—hardly the most typical location?

In 1859, the Bolckow, Vaughan & Co Ironworks got fed up of dirty water from the Tees blocking up their boilers. They decided that a better solution would be to drill a borehole and extract clean water from underground. After a few years of boring, they unexpectedly discovered a huge bed of rock salt some 1200ft underground.

Rock salt, as it happens, is useful in all sorts of chemical processes being undertaken on nearby sites, so by 1887, the Cleveland Salt Company was founded to extract it, pumping water into wells and then using the heat of the ironworks to evaporate out the salt. Over the following six decades, hundreds of thousands of tons of salt were extracted through four different wells.

In fact, the salt mine ended up outlasting the ironworks: the ironworks collapsed in 1929, but the salt kept flowing until after the Second World War, with the works having been converted to run off their own coal supply rather than the waste heat of the ironworks.

Sometimes, I suppose one’s side-hustle outlasts one’s primary employment.

In 2012, I went for a look at Middlesbrough’s newly constructed Community in a Cube (CIAC), a bizarre residential building with startling architecture, including some houses perched on the roof. Seven years later, I went back to see how it had settled in. After 21 years of blogging, there are no new ideas left. So, five years after my last visit, I’ve been back again.

CIAC is in Middlehaven, the bit of Middlesbrough which surrounds the dock. The area had an ambitious masterplan by Will Alsop. In the initial phase, CIAC was intended to be one of five cuboidal residential blocks, each to be designed by a different architectural firm and employing ‘statement’ architecture. They were commonly referred to as the ‘sugar cubes’. Eventually, more cubes would be built, expanding the quirky residential provision. Here’s an idea of what it was supposed to look like, eventually:

When CIAC was constructed, as part of Middlehaven’s commitment to sustainability, it was built with a sustainable biomass boiler system to provide heating and hot water to the initial five residential blocks. But you can guess where this is going.

Only CIAC was built, and for a long while—including when I first visited—it felt a bit isolated and alien. Partly through familiarity, and partly through the limited development of Middlehaven, it feels more like it belongs these days.

When I visited five years ago, I commented on the issues that had arisen due to the flammable cladding that had been used in the building. This has led to the most visible change to the building’s appearance: the aspect shown at the top, with the geometric inset windows, has lost its cladding. I’m not sure whether there’s an intention to replace it, but I actually prefer the current appearance: the geometric shapes being formed through industrial steel feel a bit more in keeping with the area than the previous wooden effect.

Originally, the block was surrounded by naked streets: these have long since closed, replaced with traditional roads and footpaths. Some sections, like the one above, are now so overgrown that it’s quite difficult to pick out where the grass verge ends and the former street begins.

The traditional roads are perhaps not quite as well-connected with public transport as they might be. The juxtaposition of ‘no public services’ and ‘let’s journey together’ made me chuckle.

Back in 2012, I noted the unique appearance of the development’s marketing suite. One might have thought that this would be a temporary structure, but it is still going strong twelve years on, now occupied by a firm of commercial property consultants.

No-one has quite got around to updating the signage promoting the marketing suite, but the greenery is doing a good job of absorbing it.

In 2012, I said that CIAC wasn’t quite to my taste, but I’ve rather warmed to it over time. A bit of quirkiness goes a long way.

In fact, I would go as far as to say that there’s simply not enough out-and-out whimsy in life. The Middlehaven masterplan was stuffed full of whimsy, and it’s a shame that more of it didn’t come off.

There was much talk at the time of its initial unveiling—and even a bit of ribbing in The Guardian about the ‘Kerplunk hotel’—a proposed hotel which bore more than a passing resemblance to the children’s game.

I recently discovered that the scale model of the masterplan is on display in MIMA, and let me tell you, sugar-cube residential blocks and a Kerplunk hotel have nothing on my favourite proposed but unrealised project in Middlehaven.

Friends: the toaster on the right of this photograph of the masterplan, just across from Middlesbrough’s Riverside Stadium, was to be a theatre. Yes, we live in a world where a toaster-shaped theatre was proposed but never built. As Liz Truss might say: That. Is. A. Disgrace.

The Northern Spire bridge in Sunderland opened in 2018. It’s the tallest structure in Sunderland, soaring to 105m—a little taller than Parliament’s Elizabeth Tower.

The A-frame pylon was manufactured in Belgium and brought to Sunderland by barge. Perhaps appropriately, the first three vehicles across the bridge after it opened were locally-built Nissans.

In 2012, I wandered around the Community in a Cube (CIAC) in Middlesbrough after I had a meeting nearby. This visually striking, sustainable, RIBA award shortlisted block of 82 flats in the redeveloping Middlehaven area of the town was of particular interest as it seemed to have become flavour of the month among architects.

Fast-forward to 2019 and the development has been back in the news for rather less welcome reasons. According to local and national press reports, inspections of the building in the wake of the Grenfell disaster have revealed that the building—and, in particular, the distinctive timber cladding—are not compliant with fire regulations. ‘Not compliant’ to the extent that a 24/7 ‘waking watch’ patrol has been implemented at a huge cost.

So, when fate brought me to a nearby meeting again today, I thought I’d use the lunch break for another quick wander to see how the development had aged.

Over the last seven years, CIAC has become a local landmark. Its visibility from the A66 and the nearby railway line, combined with the eye-catching “sky homes” perched on top of it, have made the building a familiar and commonly mentioned icon of Middlesbrough.

That said, the intended ‘riverside vision’ has never quite emerged, with CIAC remaining the sole residential development in the area. It seems somewhat isolated as a result. The current plan is for a £30m snow centre to be build nearby.

The surrounding ‘naked streets’, which I found “disconcerting” on my first visit, are now much more traditionally clothed, with separation of vehicular and pedestrian traffic. There’s also no shortage of weeds on display, which actually somewhat pleasingly soften the visual impact.

Close up, the building looks minimally weathered. The distinctive black stripes on the cladding have mostly worn away on the front of the building, but less so on the less exposed elevations.

The gigantic zebra crossing like paving remains in place at the rear. The geometrically patterned inset wall looks as sharp and fresh as ever. From this angle, I think I’d be hard-pressed to identify photographs taken today from those taken when the building was first completed.

And while seven years ago I said this building “isn’t quite to my taste”, gazing at it across the water of Middlehaven Dock today, I could almost change my mind. Perhaps it’s partly familiarity, but it feels less ‘alien spaceship’ than it did when it was first completed.

All things considered, it has aged pretty well. I’ve no idea how well it has done from a sales perspective: I hear tell from local colleagues that some of the flats are now let to students of the nearby Middlesbrough College, but there are certainly a fair few owner occupiers.

Of course, though, as successful as the visual impact has been, I wouldn’t have dreamed that such a modern building would now be deemed a major fire risk in need of hundreds of thousands of pounds of remedial work. I can’t begin to imagine how it must feel for the owners and residents of the flats to be living somewhere where they don’t feel as safe as they once did, let alone the financial consequences.

While I understand from the media coverage that it was compliant with regulations when built, this experience must surely raise questions about when the right things are really prioritised when landmark architectural developments are being designed.

I’m writing this in the courtyard of Television Centre in West London, which I happened to be passing today. I’m gazing up at the newly restored statue of Helios and watching the repaired fountains dance as they never have on any previous visit.

I think for most British people of my age, Television Centre is the home of Going Live, Live & Kicking, Blue Peter, Ed the Duck, Otis the Aardvark, and Philip Schofield and Andi Peters’s broom cupboard. After the BBC moved off the site in 2013, it has been closed for restoration and redevelopment, with luxury apartments the order of the day—albeit with three television studios remaining. It seems ironic that two-thirds of the studios in a location so closely associated with the BBC are to become the new standing home of iconic ITV programmes like This Morning any day now.

I last visited Television Centre with Wendy, a few months before it closed.

We were lucky enough to secure a place on one of the final tours of the building and were fascinated to get an understanding of the mechanics of production of TV shows (and especially news programmes). This aspect was far more interesting to both of us than the celebrity anecdotes, tour of the Match of the Day set, or inevitable visit to the gift shop.

We both felt a little uncomfortable at the tour of the ‘celebrity’ dressing rooms, knowing that they were the settings for sexual abuse: our visit coincided with a 12-month period in which horrific historical examples of abuse at the BBC were being recalled almost daily on the front pages of newspapers. The fabric of the building was also falling apart at the seams, the sense of magic ebbing away with the physical as much as the moral dilapidation.

Towards the end of the tour, we were press-ganged into making up the numbers for the studio audience of a recording of a truly terrible daytime game show which we’ve seen neither hide nor hair of since. In a high-pressured time-limited trivia finale, the host fluffed the reading of almost every question. He then got to record ‘pick-ups’, having a second (and occasionally third) go at reading them correctly. The contestant didn’t get a second go at answering them, and so presumably ended up appearing inexplicably flummoxed by perfectly simple questions, through no fault of her own. “TV magic”, it seems, still favours the “talent”.

This afternoon, Television Centre is quiet. In fact, as I tap away, I’m the only person in the courtyard. At least from the outside, the restoration appears sympathetic. The front of the site looks all the better for the landscaping that has replaced the exterior car park, which also has the effect of making the Centre seem smaller and more intimate.

I expected to feel a certain sense of melancholy from coming to a place to which I once felt such a close connection, knowing that a part of our collective cultural heritage had been auctioned off to the highest bidder and converted into apartments I could never hope to afford. And yet, that is not how I feel.

Perhaps incongruously, I feel a strange sense of satisfaction at seeing the building sympathetically restored. The impression is of quality and accessible historical grandeur, and it feels strangely as though the hope for the future inherent in redevelopment has frightened away the collected ghosts of the past.

It doesn’t feel like a wonderous “TV factory” any more, as it did from a distance in my childhood; but nor does it feel like a tainted crime scene, as it did on my last visit. It feels like a housing development sympathetically built around a listed building—which is, I suppose, exactly what it is.

This is a picture I took earlier in the week of the Millennium Bridge lit up, as it is every night, in its rainbow-like colour scheme. The current lighting system was installed in 2009, and is LED based for super energy efficiency.

It’s the (first, second, third, fourth) fifth time I’ve featured the bridge this year, so you may be bored of seeing it by now…! In my own defence, this is the first night-time shot of it!

This is one of the footpaths on the High Level Bridge linking Newcastle and Gateshead. The top deck of the High Level Bridge carries trains, whilst pedestrians and road traffic cross on the lower deck. It was opened by Queen Victoria herself, and if you’re wondering about the dates and designers, this plaque might help:

The bridge was the world’s first major wrought iron tied-arch design, and spans 1,337 feet across six spans. During the Great Fire of Newcastle and Gateshead in 1854, it’s said that the bridge “vibrated like a thin wire”.

One has to wonder whether these not-so-good vibrations caused the first flaws in the ironwork that developed to severe cracks found when the bridge was due for restoration in 2005. These led to the bridge being closed for three years, and road traffic now being restricted to only taxis and buses in a single direction.

In the first year after it re-opened, though, some 32,000 drivers – my dad and brother included – ignored these restrictions. Perhaps, like dad and Glenn, all of them got lost and confused, ended up at the entrance to the bridge before they knew it, and were unable to turn round!

In response, Northumbria Police launched a crackdown, and fined over 1,000 drivers £30 in a few short weeks. Electronic registration number capturing monitoring equipment now automatically issues fines to anyone who breaks the rules.

This is the Hownsgill Viaduct. It’s 55m high, and a little over 200m long. It used to carry the Stanhope & Tyne Railway, but these days carries only the C2C cycle route. Construction was completed in 1858 to Sir Thomas Bouch’s design.

Bouch would later go on to design the Tay Bridge, which collapsed in use. Seventy-five people were killed, and Bouch’s reputation and career were left in tatters. Whilst the Hownsgill Viaduct is still standing, its fate has become almost as grim: it’s one of the UK’s suicide hotspots. In 2011, there was a death every two weeks. In response, Durham County Council is arranging the construction of a 3m high steel tube and cable fence.

Suicide barriers are a knotty public health issue: whilst they seem logically sound, it’s difficult to come up with strong evidence of their effectiveness. The most famous study in this area (and one which came up in my Part A MFPH, as it happens) is of the Bloor Street Viaduct in Toronto – where, actually, fewer suicides occurred each year than at Hownsgill. The study suggests that whilst the Luminous Veil barrier prevented suicides from the viaduct itself, it had no impact on the suicide rate as a whole. Of course, study design is a huge problem in this field, but it remains the case that no published study has shown a reduction in the overall suicide rate as a result of the erection of a barrier.

I guess the only thing we know for certain is that suicide is better tackled through comprehensive and wide-ranging suicide prevention programmes rather than through barriers alone. Psychiatry services often suffer when healthcare resources are tight; yet the biggest cause of death in British men under the age of 35 is suicide. Let’s hope that the vital work of mental health teams isn’t dismissed by anyone as “easy pickings” in the ongoing recession.