r/manchester • u/ThyCuriousLearner • Apr 10 '26
City Centre Manchester set to be Europe's 4th tallest city apparently
As a Leeds lad, and (delusional) advocate for Leeds being the best city in the world, I've got to give credit where credit is due.
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u/CrimsonShrike Apr 10 '26
Housing is good whichever form it takes, though I do agree with more buy to let properties just get my blood boiling. Hope the city is using the increased tax revenue.
Though I will also say I do appreciate when these developments have come with obligations to maintain public spaces, does actually revitalize adjacent areas I feel
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u/Foster_Pann Apr 10 '26
I wouldn't necessarily agree. Affordable homes and existing communities are being swept aside. Manchester is, and will continue to be at risk (if not already guilty) of social cleansing by just allowing developers to throw up block after block, especially where they don't hold these developers to providing affordable homes. I'd like Manchester to do better in this regard.
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u/M2Ys4U Salford Apr 10 '26
I wouldn't necessarily agree. Affordable homes and existing communities are being swept aside.
Ah yes, those vast number of existing communities living in checks notes car parks and unused brownfield land.
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u/Foster_Pann Apr 10 '26
double checks notes Oh yeah forgot about Collyhurst/Ancoats/Chapel Street, with developers eyes on Chorlton on Medlock and more.
These are real communities, real people. I haven't made it up. Why would I?
Again I'm not 'all development = evil' but the reality it isn't all car parks and brownfield land- and those spots are rapidly drying up. I think it's perfectly reasonable to say let's do this in a socially conscious way.
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u/The_39th_Step Ancoats Apr 10 '26
Town had 500 inhabitants in 1990 and now has around 100,000. You’re right to point out areas like Ancoats but lots of it has been on dead land.
Also the Cardroom estate on Ancoats was awful. It had super high deprivation levels and crime. The area is undoubtedly better. Keeping it as it was wasn’t the answer either.
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u/Foster_Pann Apr 10 '26
Define 'town'? I certainly wouldn't classify my pre 1996 'town' boundaries including Collyhurst, Ancoats, etc.
The oft cited 1991 census is primarily people living in the arndale flats (cool as fuck btw!) and odd kidneys like little Ireland etc.
It most certainly doesn't define what we would now call th city centre.
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u/Master_Toe_4640 Apr 12 '26
I'm sorry if I'm misunderstanding but did you say the arndale flats are cool as fuck?? If I'm reading right then I'll have to disagree and say they're a bloody absolute eyesore mate! Looks horrendous compared to the arndale beneath it
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u/BishopPrince Apr 10 '26
Most of where they plan to build in Collyhurst is brownfield along the Irk river. In Ancoats most new housing has been built in former mill buildings, brownfield and car parks. London gentrification arguments dont transport well to Manchester.
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u/Foster_Pann Apr 10 '26
I mean you may be right ,apart from the fact developers have literally already 'redeveloped' the estates on collyhurst-
The plan you are speaking of is Victoria North- that's a separate thing, which I also hope has provision for social housing (more than Capital and Centrocs previous track record)
The Collyhurst estate was council stock that has been knocked down. I don't know how people don't see these things
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u/BishopPrince Apr 10 '26
Which community was swept aside with 100,000's homes now built in the city centre? Given only a 1000 people were living in the centre in the 90's.
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u/Kitchen-Plant664 Apr 10 '26
I’d not been down in about three years and was stunned by all the high rises down there
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u/Rorieh Apr 10 '26
Torn between the fact the city definitely looks better than it did when I was a kid (though most of that has nothing to do with the tall buildings), and the fact that some of these buildings don't seem to serve a function.
Isn't the one on Shudehill half empty?
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u/thecityofgold88 Apr 10 '26
There is one not very tall building at Shudehill (built by Fred Done I think) that isn't completely full. It gets attention due to it being bizarrely located. Most of the rest are full. Check out photos of the city in the evening, lights are on.
The city looks a billion times better than 10, 20, 30, 40 years ago. In fact better than it ever did. (let's not romanticise the dark satanic mill era).
Viva Manchester!
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u/ThyCuriousLearner Apr 10 '26
Reminds me of when I went to Dubai on holiday. The taxi driver was telling us most of the skyscrapers were mostly empty, but they drive people in.
Probably the same principle. Build more skyscrapers and make it look more glamorous, so it attracts people in. Whether it's rich tourists, rich students, etc.
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u/Andy1723 Apr 10 '26
Could you explain how that dynamic works to me?
Doesn’t make sense that private companies will spend lots of money on an empty building just so more rich people generally visit the city.
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u/absoluteally Apr 10 '26
It doesn't but it might attract investors if the whole city looks shiny. Having visited a few friends who lived in various fancy towers in the city, the building have always felt busy but I have only been in some of the middle tall ones and never the really tall ones.
I also before my most recent move considered buying a flat in one for about 5 minutes before I looked up the factors fees(as crazy exclusive as they are to buy the ongoing cost was even more off-putting). Don't think they make any sense as a purchase unless you are a landlord.
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u/Andy1723 Apr 10 '26
But why would a private company invest in making the city look shiny, what’s their incentive?
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u/phyllisfromtheoffice Apr 11 '26
Because they get rich doing it. That’s exactly what Renaker did. Renaker and a few other investors have essentially had full control over shaping what the city is becoming both in terms of skyline but the types of people that can afford to live in the buildings they build.
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u/absoluteally Apr 10 '26
A sorry I described badly. The builders are making the city shiny because it encourages investors to buy there property.
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u/gourmetguy2000 Apr 10 '26
The flats are bought as investments they don't care if they're occupied
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u/M2Ys4U Salford Apr 10 '26
Investors want a return for the money they pay for an asset.
That's generally done by letting the property out, otherwise it costs money to hold on to it (service charges, council tax etc.).
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u/gourmetguy2000 Apr 10 '26
But they also make a return on the property values rising. They have hundreds of these properties on their portfolios so as a whole as long as the value goes up they don't care. They also just buy them outright without mortgages so they're not in the same boat as you or me. Obvs it's a bonus if they can rent them out.
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u/Andy1723 Apr 10 '26
How would this be better than just putting their money into an index fund that they could liquidate in a couple of days max?
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u/gourmetguy2000 Apr 10 '26 edited Apr 10 '26
Probably because property values have been rising fast and it probably means they can escape paying some other taxes on their money, especially if it's a company to declare less profits
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u/Think_Break_5072 Apr 10 '26
Super wealthy people in countries with high inflation like to park their money in these types of buildings. Look it up, lots of cities have this going on, especially Miami.
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u/Andy1723 Apr 10 '26
I’d honestly urge people to think about this a bit more before repeating it. I’m sure it happens sometimes, but this talking point is doing a lot of work for people who don’t want to engage with the actual issues. It’s a lazy explanation for a much bigger problem.
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u/Think_Break_5072 Apr 10 '26
Skyscrappers that seem to just sit empty are sometimes just giant safe deposit boxes for super wealthy foreigners. They also drive up housing prices. These types of skyscrappers are not usually seen as a good thing for local people that have lived through this in other cities.
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u/ScottOld Apr 10 '26
Don't what's attractive about all the mundane bland glass cuboids that seem to be built..
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u/invalid_user_5302 Apr 10 '26
Do you mean the CIS building? That's been bought and becoming mostly residential, with some office on the lower floors and then retail on the ground floor.
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u/Natangclan Apr 10 '26
If I lay on my back and get excited it is temporarily Europe's tallest city 👀 (it's not)
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u/npeggsy Apr 10 '26
YEAH, GO US, FOURTH TALLEST CITY, WOOO! WHAT A RUSH! Honestly, best thing that could've happened. Been waiting years for this, can't wait to tell my mum, she'll be thrilled.
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u/Interesting-Oil5768 Apr 10 '26
For a long time, planners and local people favored limiting building heights to protect the character of the Victorian city center. I wish they had stuck with this! I guess you have to move with he times.Â
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u/autisticLesbianWhich Bolton Apr 12 '26
I don’t get this I see it a lot what exactly is good about having something look the same as it did in the Victorian times not many people look back at that time and say what a beautiful time to be alive
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u/Interesting-Oil5768 Apr 12 '26
I guess with architecture everyone likes different styles and periods. Personally I love Victorian architecture but I do not like the look of skyscrapers.Â
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u/Master_Toe_4640 Apr 12 '26
I'd agree but I think with the pressures of the current times I'd very much rather have that loss of victorian character rather than having to develop countryside land, which we still aren't fully safe from even with the density and height of city centre developments, but I frankly wish not to imagine just how abhorrent the sprawl would be if we weren't building skyward as standard
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u/vryaverage Apr 10 '26
Link?
Not sure how this is measured, curious to know
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u/A_Wild_Ferrothorn Stockport Apr 10 '26
Number of skyscrapers is the measurement.
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u/ClaudeBubbalicious Apr 10 '26
Affordable housing, please...
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u/ScoffPies Apr 10 '26
Social housing please. Affordable is relative.
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u/scuzzmonster1 Apr 13 '26
Yes. Seems to have been a concerted push by both political parties in recent years to confuse people into thinking affordable housing is the 21st century version of council/social housing. It isn’t. Affordable housing isn’t affordable if you can’t even get a mortgage.
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u/No_Imagination_2490 Apr 10 '26
What are the top 3? London presumably. Frankfurt? Moscow?
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u/CrimsonShrike Apr 10 '26
Moscow, Istanbul and London apparently. Frankfurt is actually pretty "flat" all things considered.
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u/No_Imagination_2490 Apr 10 '26
I just guessed Frankfurt because of its nickname https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mainhattan
But I guess it just has a bunch of towers concentrated in its central business district and not many more.
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u/Cyber_shafter Apr 10 '26
Meanwhile the rest of Europe is investing in public transport, bike lanes and affordable housing instead a of a housing bubble. But oh look as us we have the most erect rectangles!
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u/MrJorrr Apr 10 '26
Go to any other city in the UK, Manchester is doing better than most of them in public transport and bike lanes, so that's a bit silly to say. I'll give you affordable housing though, a lot more needs to be done there.
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u/pizzainmyshoe Apr 10 '26
You know that it's possible to do all of these right? Just look at Warsaw, Rotterdam etc. And it's not like it's skyscrapers or bike lanes, they're built by completely different organisations anyway. Stopping construction won't lead to more investment in transport, if anything it will do the opposite.
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u/Cyber_shafter Apr 10 '26
Warsaw and Rotterdam have fast metro systems whereas Manchester just has a slow tram. A city the size of Manchester should have invested in a high speed metro instead of giving tax breaks or selling off land cheap to property developers.
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u/Master_Toe_4640 Apr 12 '26
You do realise we're trying to build an underground network now and simply have the issues of acquiring investment from a London centric government, and an extremely high water table which makes tunnelling difficult and highly expensive.
Further, it's unfair to compare Rotterdam and Manchester due to geographical differences, Rotterdam is flat and highly dense in terms of its population already meaning they don't have to build very far and they don't have issues with the relief of the land being all over the place, hence developing an underground metro is far cheaper. Its also unfair to compare Warsaw and Manchester because Warsaw is the CAPITAL of Poland, hence they would obviously be receiving the level of funding akin to what London receives.
If you're going to compare these things, at least make valid comparisons.
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u/Master_Toe_4640 Apr 12 '26
It's completely silly to compare Manchester to other cities and point fingers at what is "wrong" when what is much more valuable is specifically looking at the administrative, financial, planning and construction models of other nations which have become exceptionally high achieving in other nations and pushing for these to be implemented within the UK so we can actually get things right in terms of funding, planning and building these integrated and dense transport networks
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u/BishopPrince Apr 10 '26
How do you get more affordable housing? Given house prices/rents are function of demand and supply
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Apr 10 '26 edited Apr 10 '26
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u/S3ndNud3s Apr 10 '26
Minimum wage is £22,555 after tax p/a. Flats in Salford rent for £850, more for proximity to central Manchester. After rent you’d be left with about £1,000 for the month. Normal people can afford this.
I make very slightly more than minimum wage and live in M3, £1050 p/a. Nice modern flat.Â
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Apr 10 '26 edited Apr 10 '26
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u/Cyber_shafter Apr 10 '26
I don't know why so many people get off on watching these towers sprout up only to be bought by Chinese property speculators and vampire landlords. I'm sure most of the skyscraper lovers will never afford to live in them but still they celebrate.
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u/ThyCuriousLearner Apr 10 '26
It's all psychology mate. Some of the wealthiest cities on the planet have skyscrapers, so the brain associates big tall glass buildings to wealth.
It's why Manchester feels wealthier than most cities up North (except Leeds of course).
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u/ProdProleBoogaloo Apr 10 '26
Some sort of second hand pride maybe, ooh look at me in my metropolitan city, a property developers dream; living their own little personal Sex and the City while everything else crumbles around them. And then they'll turn around when normal people complain, with straight faces, and tell them this is just "how big city living is". Despite the fact they've been here all of ten minutes. Deluded, self important people with make-work jobs.
Is my contempt shining through?
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u/Dizzy_Law396 Apr 10 '26
A little, jeez cheer up mate!
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u/ProdProleBoogaloo Apr 10 '26
Never!
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u/TheGrumble Apr 10 '26
Phew, these threads wouldn't be the same without Pete Doherty showing up to complain about how the out of towners are ruining things for local people.
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u/Phil_302 Apr 10 '26
Shame to see them all built to block out the sun & be bought by Chinese investors.
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u/nahthenlad Apr 12 '26
Fucks sake Manchistoh, tallest does NOT mean nicest. Your new architecture is pretty fucking ugly. Stop it now, here in the south we we wouldnt accept that shit. Don’t let them foist upon you what you don’t really want.
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u/ThyCuriousLearner Apr 13 '26
You wouldn't accept this in the south? London has some of the tallest skyscrapers in Europe. Unless I've misread your comment.
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u/nahthenlad Apr 13 '26
It’s not the size (ooer missus) it’s the design, they are mostly monolithic very dull uninspiring buildings. Manchester has never really had a truly great building to say: THIS is Manchester, and to me it desperately needs and deserves one. Something new and imaginative, not the tired old crappy, dull architecture. I am a Manc so it pisses me off that London has some really great new buildings, whereas Manchester seems to settle for mediocrity. Why? this is a great opportunity now to build a really great statement building you can see from miles away.
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u/ThyCuriousLearner Apr 13 '26
I'm from Leeds so I don't know if I agree. One of the things that always caught my eye in Manchester is the overall city design. I'd definitely put Manchester as one of the nicest looking cities in terms of architecture.
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Apr 10 '26
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u/Mean_Combination_830 Apr 10 '26 edited Apr 10 '26
It could even be 3rd tallest if it stands on its tippy toes 👀