Cardiff Bay Redevelopment Investigation

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Cardiff Bay Redevelopment Investigation

Cardiff is a city steeped in history and has undergone many changes

and influences over 1500 years; initially with the settlements of the

Celts in 500BC, and over many years Cardiff became a Roman Fort and

Norman stronghold. In 1810 Cardiff was just a growing village of less

than 2000 inhabitants surrounded by heavily tidal marshland and fed by

two rivers, the Taff and the Ely. Laying closely to the south was

Butetown, located in the Parish of Saint Mary's. Back then, Cardiff's

main industry was the mining and transportation of coal, mainly by big

25 tonne load barges.

As the Industrial Revolution swept over the British Isles, demand for

coal grew considerably. The Glamorganshire canal, which was built in

1794 to transport iron from the Merthyr ironworks to Cardiff, could

not cope with the strain and as the iron and coal industry expanded

the Taff Vale Railway was opened in 1840 to offer an alternative mode

of transport for this and to connect the Cardiff and surrounding

steelworks to the coal.

By this time John Crichton Stewart the 2nd Marquis of Bute had

finished his development of the bay and had just opened the West

docks. The building of docks continued untill around 1907 when the

last dock, the Queen Alexandra had been built adding to the previous

four. The opening of the West Docks gave Cardiff an advantage over

other Welsh ports and soon coal from the nearby South Wales Coalfield

was being used and exported along with iron and steel, whilst various

products including oils and tin were imported. The city prospered,

industry exploded and unemployment was rare.

The Cardif...

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workers for residence in its homes. I also think that there would be a

large market for residential areas for more of these and those who are

on a slightly lower income also. There are the perfect facilities

surrounding them which would attract a lot of people. Countering this,

land prices may be too expensive to enable this and so the lower

income housing may not be able to be put in to plan.

Maybe as an extra income window, some of the sites that gave Butetown

and Tiger Bay its history could be opened up or re-constructed as

another tourist attraction. The old docks and way of life could be

depicted, and the novelty of having so much historical activity in a

small community can be used through a tour of the bay where people can

make a direct link to the past as these were the actual scenes of

events.

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