Doncaster Town Centre

[Glyn_Wigley]

I imagine that sometimes it's difficult to follow the correct procedure if you suspect that you're about to get your brains blown out.

If you're not capable of following the proper procedures that you've been trained to follow, in the circumstances that you've been trained to expect to use them in, then you shouldn't be allowed anywhere near a gun, don't you agree?

You're talking b*llocks, Wigley.

No one knows how they'll react under that sort of pressure and no amount of training, no matter how good, will guarantee that people will make the "correct" decision.

Wooly thinking on your part based on your utter lack of subject knowledge.

Yeah, when someone cracks, let's just sweep it under the carpet. Nothing to learn from any investigation into what went wrong and why. A shrug of the shoulders will do and if anyone questions it simply tell them 'you don't understand, so there'.

[knockers]

Wasn't this thread about how lovely our town is?

[rtid88]

Wasn't this thread about how lovely our town is?

No, it was about how awful it has become over the past 10-15 years!

[Muttley]

I don't really get why they are building new shops at Waterdale when there are loads of empty units anyway, but there are definitely some good new ventures opening up - The City supposedly serves great Polish food and I love the little secondhand/ collectives shop Rewind.

Good luck to your missus' new venture!

[knockers]

Sad, I looked for Brickinit on Friday to drop a poster off for the Doncaster VW show but couldn't find it. I'd been speaking to her on Twitter about it. Whereabouts is it?
Cheers

[Sprotyrover]

Nice to see Waterdale picking up I can recall it used to be busy in the Seventies then went down hill,niche shops are the answer and maybe a few shops to attract accompanied kids.

[i_ateallthepies]

Is Kingsgate one of the pedestrianised streets? doesn't appear on any Waterdale map I can find.

[knockers]

Will do-thanks

[BobG]

Made me giggle then Sad when you mentioned "the old ABC". I remember that damn place being built. It was THE wow building in town: way sexier than the Gaumont and the Odeon. Kes had it's world premier there. I saw Where Eagles Dare and Clockwork Orange there. I know times move on, but you know what? By any standard except human, it's not that long ago.

Bob

[RobTheRover]

I used to like the ABC better than the Gaumont/Odeon.  I saw Jaws and Grease there when I was a kid (god knows how I got into Jaws - it scared me to death.  Think I was about 6 and went with my older sister).  The best time ever was one Halloween in about 1988 when they showed all 6 (at that point) Friday the 13th movies back to back.  9 hours in the company of Jason Vorhees and his hockey mask.

[BobG]

Didn't they convert the ABC into a 3 screen place? I've not been in the place for aeons so I never saw it if they did. I always thought, as a single screen cinema, it was a nice place inside. I saw Jaws there too Rob when it first came out. Took a girl from school. She wasn't much interested in me. I was the means to an end...

I quite like brutalist architecture too Sad. (You ever seen any of the wall bits of the Westwall?) It'd be a shame to lose the ABC - especially after the Council allowed the Gaumont to be knocked down. That was scandalous. A real gem of its type. Did you know there used to be a restaurant on the first floor that had windows looking out over the High Street/Waterdale junction? Those windows were done away with in favour of that nondescript grey plastic looking corrugated sheeting when the place was tarted up in the 70's I should think.

Bob

[Sprotyrover]

cop shop and Courts were built by the notorious Poulson.

[jonnydog]

I used to like the ABC better than the Gaumont/Odeon.  I saw Jaws and Grease there when I was a kid (god knows how I got into Jaws - it scared me to death.  Think I was about 6 and went with my older sister).  The best time ever was one Halloween in about 1988 when they showed all 6 (at that point) Friday the 13th movies back to back.  9 hours in the company of Jason Vorhees and his hockey mask.

... And his mam!!

[Boomstick]

Been told the cop shop was designed to withstand a nuclear shockwave. If war with Russia was imminent, the gap between the huge, thick wedge shaped concrete wall, and the main building would have been filled with sand. Makes sense when you look at it, its like a bunker.
Not sure about the court building, but that looks solid too, with the huge wedge at the base.

[LongbridgeMGRover]

I spent a few months with the probation service working in that building in the late 70s but never knew Poulson was involved, where's the unfinished roads? I am reminded of 'Threads' by talk of a nuclear resistant bunker. Amazing film where post apocalyptic Sheffield was populated by grunting savages after a nuclear strike on Finningley. Hang on, did I miss something?

[dknward2]

Some of them places on 28 days later are amazing

[Bentley Bullet]

Someone told me that the old ABC is now a rats Butlins.

[LongbridgeMGRover]

I must admit to being a fan of the Brutalist movement. At the moment there seems to be a cultural backlash against it, and lots of buildings have gone before they could be appreciated fully in their historical context.

Is the concrete bridge from the Waterdale centre to the former bus station still there? That is just so 1960s.

Sadly, near where I live, 60s architecture is being destroyed with a real vengeance.

New Street station hasn't been rebuilt, it's had its features chiselled away and covered with stainless steel cladding and topped by a shopping centre.

John Madin was the designer of many buildings in Birmingham that have been destroyed: BBC Pebble Mill and the Central Library are the most notable casualties, their replacements are not worth talking about.

[LongbridgeMGRover]

I caught the first day of the destruction of the Library

[BobG]

I've spent weeks and weeks and weeks engrossed by that 28dayslater website. Awesome site. Have you seen the reports on the derelict hydro power station behind and beneath the Niagara Falls? Gordon Bennett!!

And New Street, Longbridge, is as bloody awful now as it was in the 1970's despite all the hundreds of millions they've chucked at it. Nasty place. And have you stood on a platform there? If you hiccough you'll fall off the platform edge.

Bob

[Sprotyrover]

The Cop shop courts and Coal house were all nuclear Bunkers,the buildings were started under West Yorks county council and the plan was to build a town hall where the Cast is there was going to be an underground car park which was accessed in between the Cop shop and Court building if you stand at the top of the ramp you will see a large sliding door at the bottom.  Which is a dead end. There are two tunnels linking the buildings and six huge holding cells under the court and other rooms likewise a maze of tunnels under the cop shop one which is a dead end was was built to go under college Road to a proposed Crown court building.
The plug was pulled when we became South Yorkshire and the funding from Wakefield went into projects in the New West Yorkshire.

[i_ateallthepies]

No matter how much I try to train my eye to believe it, I am seeing the library as foreground and the church further back which makes the perspective all wrong with the digger arm behind the steeple.

Weird!!!

[i_ateallthepies]

Is Kingsgate one of the pedestrianised streets? doesn't appear on any Waterdale map I can find.

Kingsgate runs from Cleveland Street to the Library, Queensgate runs from the South Bus Station and Princegate runs from the Job Center on Wood Street to the Staff of Life pub. Only Princegate shows on the map as it's the only one with vehicle access.

Thanks Sad, I'll have a look in Aardvark Saturday.

[i_ateallthepies]

Made me giggle then Sad when you mentioned "the old ABC". I remember that damn place being built. It was THE wow building in town: way sexier than the Gaumont and the Odeon. Kes had it's world premier there. I saw Where Eagles Dare and Clockwork Orange there. I know times move on, but you know what? By any standard except human, it's not that long ago.

Bob

I saw The Deer Hunter at the ABC, my God, affected me for a week that did.

[turnbull for england]

Aardvark is run by a big rovers fan simon saynor

[DonnyOsmond]

Just had a look at that 28dayslater. I'm late 20s so I remember the Odeon looking like the recent picture but it actually looked pretty nice as it initially was and would have made a decent theatre if it was made to look like that again. And the Grand Theatre, is that next to Sainsburys at the Frenchgate?

[rtid88]

I thought there had been talks of the Grand Theatre opening a few years back. It seems such a shame that such amazing buildings like that and the ABC are left to ruin but eyesores like the new Frenchgate and new council building have millions of pounds spent on them!!!

[Muttley]

cop shop and Courts were built by the notorious Poulson.

That was Coal House, don't think Poulson had anything to do with the court and police station.

The court and police station were both designed by Sir Frederick Gibberd and are excellent examples of British Brutalism (note the use of cobblestones on the sloping base, a typical feature). Gibberd also designed the catholic cathedral in Liverpool aka Paddy's wigwam and a number of London housing estates.

I believe that Gibberd also had a hand in the design of the Waterdale centre - the library building actually has some sleek Modernist lines (narrow Windows, tiled surfaces) although now somewhat obscured by those ugly brown plastic panels, and there are touches of London housing estates in the residential parts of Waterdale such as communal refuse disposal chutes - see pic.

[LongbridgeMGRover]

https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=images&cd=&ved=0ahUKEwiDgNXa2fzOAhVFnRQKHTkrAJ8QjRwIBw&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.pinterest.com%2Fpin%2F499899627365119168%2F&psig=AFQjCNGB9mQ42nLVC9_Aj3nyQ1ypyQHswA&ust=1473318617789369

Waterdale's function for many years was as an area for buses and coaches to pick up.

When the new Southern Bus station was built, the ramshackle bus shelters opposite the library were removed and it became a flat piece of land, which became a car park.

However some services still used the old bus station, notably Barton Buses, whose coaches ran from points in the North East through York's and Notts to Coventry serving miners and their families.

They used to arrive several at a time in a 'bus train'.

Waterdale was the midway point where they crossed, a fascinating sight (if you are a bus spotter!)

[Copps is Magic]

Can't agree with the comments about Birmingham library. I never went to the old one but the new is an absolutely brilliant building, particularly inside.

I agree, however, that the Waterdale died when the buses stopped using the bus station. That was probably the main reason people walked through the area.

Always thought a good way to link town with the new civic quarter would be to rebuild the central library which is in a pretty terrible state for town this size.