I recently had my attention directed to the Historic England Heritage at Risk Register which is up-dated every few years. I accessed the site by googling the above and then using the interactive map to click on sites which are shown as red dots across the national map. This brings-up a short summary for each dot/location. To be fair the map is a mass of red dots and Humberside is one of the least dense areas (for London it is virtually impossible to distinguish one dot from another). The ‘level of concern’ at each site, from Historic England’s point of view, is reflected in the terminology used.
The two sites that can readily be checked for Hull come as no surprise – they are the dereliction at St. Andrew’s Dock and the linear conservation area along Beverley Road.
As regards the Dock, the ex-Lord Line building and the post-war building alongside the lock entrance have been so systematically vandalised as to leave little but the shell in place, this also so of nearby buildings including one supporting a large tank which provided hydraulic power to open the lock gates back in the day which I think is a listed building. Ironically it is the dereliction and re-colonisation by Nature that makes this area, for me at least, more interesting than it will be when houses and flats are eventually built on site. The eastern end of the Dock has now evolved to a dense reedbed and thus should have some sort of wildlife protection order. The western end of the Dock was filled-in and made into a retail and entertainment complex in the 1970s, the entertainment complex has long gone and at least one of the retail outlets has stood empty for over two years. However the area is spacious and stands beside the Humber Estuary, the views of which have been somewhat obscured by the new flood wall defences.
(to be continued)
