As Simon Jenkins witters on about tall buildings in London generally like the Renzo Piano proposal for Paddington spare a thought for long suffering local folk around the Marylebone flyover.  

BEFORE Renzo Piano goes about planning a 65-storey tower in Paddington for his developer clients, can someone sort out the awful skyline we already have in Paddington along either sides of the Marylebone flyover with its four towers? We have here first the appalling cladding of Capital House; the derelict Burne House left empty by BT for decades; then the grey, featureless architect of Metropole Hotel and finally, and not least, Paddington Green police station which looks the best of the four towers around the Marylebone flyover. Things have been like this since the West way came into Paddington. Quite honestly any improvement on the skyline of Paddington should start here before we have any additions.

This blog has been published as a letter in the pages of the West End Extra date the 6th of November

http://www.standard.co.uk/comment/comment/simon-jenkins-west-london-could-be-getting-shafted-with-the-paddington-shard-a3142761.html

Before City of Westminster pushes through the so called Paddington Shard, could it please sort out the mess its made already with the skyline of Paddington around the Marylebone flyover, a gateway by road into Central London.  The four towers illustrate the worst of 1970’s and 1980’s architect with some grey featureless architect, awful cladding and some left unused derelict.  Its not something the council can be proud off at all and needs sorting out before adding anything else to the skyline in Paddington.  

Paddington deserves much better. Since the West way was pushed through Paddington in the 1960’s, it has not had a centre to speak off and today has not sufficient space, as the mass of tourists passing through the railway station increases exponentially. So an empty monument too luxury market speculation in the middle of Paddington such won’t do.