Tale of the riverbank

Date: 17 September 2006
Author: Ken Symon of the Sunday Herald


The world comes to Glasgow next month for the fourth international Waterfront Expo exhibition, reports Ken Symon.

Developers and civic leaders from around the world will visit Glasgow next month to study the redevelopment of the River Clyde.

About 450 delegates from 33 countries who are planning or already working on waterfront developments will attend the Waterfront Expo 2006 conference and exhibition.

Mark Beaumont, head of Media Generation Events which is organising the Waterfront Expo, said: “If you look along the Clyde there are some grotty, grungy areas there. So any city that has the same gray and dull brown sites can learn from what is being done on the Clyde.”

Beaumont said that the Clyde redevelopment was being watch closely by a range of public and private sector organisations concerned with water front developments in China, New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, Canada and many European countries.

More than 40 companies – including architects, building and material suppliers, land reclamation contractors and firms from the financial and legal sector – are exhibiting at the event.

Steven Purcell, the chair of the Clyde Waterfront Strategic Partnership and leader of Glasgow City Council, said: “Through ambitious public/private partnership, the river has been reborn and continues to grow as a vibrant place to be.

“The Clyde is now a powerhouse for the city – providing many homes and jobs for the people of Glasgow. Hosting this event will send a clear signal around the world that we have the ambition, drive, courage and commitment to restore the River Clyde to pride of place among the world's great rivers.”

The hosting of the Waterfront Expo exhibition will be another step forward in the redevelopment of the Clyde, which this weekend is seeing the opening of the new Finnieston bridge.

The four lane “squinty” bridge was due to open to pedestrians at the weekend and will open to traffic tomorrow.

The new bridge is the first new road link across the river for decades and is seen by developers as key in directly linking parts of the city never linked before. The new Glasgow harbour development is therefore able to be marketed along with the redevelopment of Govan – an example of how the role of the Clyde is becoming more central to Glasgow's portfolio.

Examples of other cities being looked at include the current reconstruction of the New Orleans waterfront following the devastation wreaked there by Hurricane Katrina.

In addition to the presentation of case studies of previous developments including Wellington in New Zealand, Hamburg, Lisbon, Orestad, Oslo, Porto Cristovao in Brazil, Toronto, St Petersburg, Manchester and Chicago the delegates will have the opportunity to visit sites around the Clyde to see the progress of the major redevelopment programme here.

Site visits include a Clyde waterfront boat tour, visits to the Xscape leisure development on the Renfrew Riverside, Glasgow Harbour, Speirs Wharf, extended tours on October 20 to the Edinburgh waterfront via the Falkirk Wheel and a Glasgow regional tour which includes visits to the Gorbals estate, Govan, Clydebank and Inverclyde.

This is the fourth time the annual Waterfront Expo conference and exhibition has been held, the previous ones being in London, Amsterdam and Riga. Beaumont said there was increasing interest in the exhibition.

For the first time this year's event will have focus sessions running parallel to the main programme, covering issues such as marketing waterfronts, connecting with communities, waterfront planning and design, transport systems, project funding and tourism developments.

Beaumont said: “There has been a movement to develop city waterfronts ever since Boston developed its waterfront back in the seventies. Around 80% of cities are on some kind of water course, whether it is a river, a canal, a lake or the sea and so there is a huge interest in this.

“Cities realise that they have to redevelop to position themselves against their competitors. There is such a huge scale of investment involved in these projects that you cannot afford to mess it up; you have to get it absolutely right.”

He said that the advantage of the Waterfront Expo was that the delegates could see what had been done in a lot of different cities all in one place and in just a few days.

He said that there was a wider and wider group of businesses and organisations represented at the event. “This year we've even got a firm that specialises in security for marinas. Boat crime is on the rise and this company's business is to tackle that problem.”

Key sessions, chaired by Charlie Hughes, the CEO of Smart Futures UK, will look at competitive waterfront cities and positioning waterfront cities in a global market.

Editors’ Notes

For further information on WaterfrontExpo 2006 visit:

For details of Scottish waterfront developments go to:

Issued on behalf of Media Generation Events Ltd by fs communications.

For further information contact:

Mark Beaumont: 02380 262238 or 07753817813
Frank Sullivan: 07718660122 or 01786 473289

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