The first look at a raft of improvements to Black Rock have been revealed.
Plans to landscape the area were announced last year, just weeks before a long-planned scheme to build a conference centre there was put on hold while developers tried to find a city centre location instead.
Brighton and Hove City Council’s planning application for a major facelift to the area have now been submitted, including a series of artist’s impressions of how it could look.
Among the changes are:
- Extending the seawall at Black Rock and designating as a public space with a temporary bicycle pump-track, games area, seating and new promenade
New boardwalks along the shingle from Volk’s Workshop and the Black Rock terminus - Creating a hub around the Old Reading Room and Volk’s Black Rock station
- New planting and benches around Volk’s Workshop
- New children’s playground between the car park and Black Rock station
- New crossings from the Kemp Town Enclosures and the beach, wide road with marked out cycle lane and new lighting
- Gently sloping routes through the Kemp Town enclosures
- Extending Madeira Drive for traffic through a new gateway to Brighton Marina, big enough for a double decker bus
The Black Rock car park will lose ten of its spaces to public realm, but the rest of the spaces will be rearranged to be more space efficient.
A new toilet block modelled on the one at the Level, with a biodiverse roof, is also planned.
1. Upper boardwalk providing gently sloping access from the top of Duke’s Mound to the Esplanade 2. Boardwalk 3. New vegetated shingle habitat 4. New level terrace to the front of the Old Reading Room, providing space for seating 5. Improvements to the Volk’s Black Rock station plaza – new lighting, wayfinding and surface finish 6. New play area for children aged 5-11 7. New public toilet facilities with biodiverse roof 8. Existing Black Rock car park retained in use 9. New sea wall with promenade, soft treatment and seating steps to inside face. New BMX pump-track
Who was commissioned to design these new ‘improvements, please? Who drew the plans?
More to the point Jax why isnt the money being spent on the Terraces as well as the money already allocated?The Terraces should have priority as they will bring in revenue.
“A new toilet block modelled on the one at the Level”, and I assume it too will be locked in my time of need.
Does that toilet block really have to go in that exact location? Slightly to the south and it wouldn’t block a future extension of the Volks to the Marina, which is long overdue.
Ha, my bad. The numbers are hard to read on a phone as the images are so low res. I thought the car park was numbered as the loo block! 🙂 As you were.
Well yes, Rollivan, I was going to get onto that later! Strange how all this money is available to develop something that isn’t actually anything! After stating there IS no money?????
As we know, there are many objections to this scheme, not least the proposed use of Duke’s Mound & junction there!
Madeira Terraces should take priority over any of this! It’s really ridiculous & there is something severely lacking going on here.
I’m going to look into it more later today when I have some time
Perhaps those in the Planning Department are trying to justify their need and are just using up their budget allocation?
re: Plans and money. There was a public consultation held in the town hall and in the Mariner in the marina. I understand that the money is coming from a coastal development grant and has little or nothing to do with Brighton Council taxpayers. The planning people at the consultation were very open and honest and really keen to get feedback to bring improvement to an area that has been largely ignored since the marina development of nearly 50 years ago. As a resident of Black Rock I am really happy that this is actually happening. Interestingly the beach there has become more popular and well used in the summer.
Why ‘raft of improvements’ and not just ‘improvements’? Lazy journalistic cliche.
It looks to me like the Entertainment and Conference Centre is dead in the water.
I spoke to somebody in planning about access to and from for very large Vehicles that will be bringing in equipment.How will they exit via Dukes Mound if Madeira Dve is entry only at The Palace Pier.The whole Palace Pier Junction has been ill thought and a larger roundabout would be a better solution.
is there a link to the proposed plans rather than just whats posted in this news page for those wishing to look at the plans in detail
Hi Frank, sadly the way the council’s new planning portal is set up means links often don’t work – but you can search for it on the council’s planning portal using the reference BH2020/00442
Where are the Volk’s workers going to park their vehicles??
Why don’t they extend the volks so it actually pays for itself. If it ran to the marina, going to the films there may actually be an appealing thing to do.