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Darwin structure is out of line
Thursday 30th July 2009, 1:45PM BST.
The structure is currently surrounded by scaffolding
The £350,000 sculpture being built to celebrate the bicentenary of Charles Darwin, Shrewsbury’s most famous son, has been hit by technical problems which may never be resolved, it was revealed today.
The 12m-high Quantum Leap, which is being erected in Mardol Gardens, is reportedly incorrectly aligned and as much as 18in off course at the top of the structure.
Shropshire Council business development manager Dominic Wallis, who is helping to lead the project, said he was hopeful the problems would be rectified.
He said: “As far as I am aware there are some issues with the alignment and the contractor and contract administrators are trying to resolve the issues.
“It’s difficult to say how far it is out as it is only on one particular angle and you can only just about notice it.
“It’s something I have noticed because I have lived and breathed the project for so long.”
However, he said it was possible that the problem could not be corrected. “I hope it can, but it could be that it’s unresolvable,” he said. “I just don’t know.”
Mr Wallis said, although the sculpture may not be able to be put straight, it would still be able to stand proudly across the river from the new £28 million Theatre Severn.
He said: “It is rock solid and it’s not going to move.”
No-one at contractor Alun Griffiths was available for comment on the issue.
By Russell Roberts
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What a waste of taxpayers money…it looks awful!
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£350,000 would have been a great contribution towards an ice rink for the county town. However, Shrewsbury has a nice display of scaffolding.
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why is everyone so negative.. the fish are gonna love it when the river comes up again this winter
seriouselly though, i like it a lot
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I think it looks a lot nicer than the sketches showed. Just hope they sort it out!
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What a boring narrow minded town we live in. Good job Darwin stuck to his findings and was not so narrow minded.
What a great structure and talking point for the town.
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It is without doubt this is another plot on the landscape left for us to inherit from SABC, having one piece of so called art in Mardol dedicated to Darwin, plus his statue outside the library did we need another one, one that looks so abysmal at that . However one as to question the skills of the authority engineers who must have studied the plans and who should have overseen and stopped the erection process when it was established that an error had been made, this is gross incompetence by all.
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Just leave it and see what it evolves in to.
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I think it is great that the town is spending time on projects like this that make Shrewsbury stand out from the many plastic towns there are ! I also think it looks great . Well done Shrewsbury !
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i like the thing
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What a wast of our money!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Could have dome more good giving the money to the HOSPICE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I am so angry with you people out there wasting
precious money
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What a complete waste of time. I hope that the Council will now sue the construction firm for incompetence and get back a good bit of the £350,000 that they wasted in the first place.
Why didn’t the local taxpayer have a say in whether this eyesore was built in the first place, after all it is OUR money.
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“i want my money back” they used my tax money and wasted it so why shouldn’t i get a refund on my tax
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I’m on the wither wather about this new piece of Darwin art.Publicity pictures of the completed sculpture show it to be almost white in appearance.I hope it doesn’t stay the dirty brown concrete colour it is now otherwise it will look old before its time like the cladding on The Shed – oops sorry Theatre Severn!
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Have to agree it a total waste of money. Who is going to made a trip to Shrewsbury to see a thing like that? Ice rink sounds a better idea by far, it could even be named the Darwin Leisure Centre
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Hopefully it will realign itself about 18 feet into the Severn before too long
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I was wondering how many comments would pass by before someone made a reference to Theatre Severn, something which is obviously completely unrelated to this project……..
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JLQ. Quantom Leap, Theatre Severn – the both go together with their design and faulty construction.Just wait until the new hotel, which plans show it to resemble a prison block, is built further along Smithfield Road then we will have another monstrosity in the town.
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I was referring to the river rather than the qaste of money on the opposite bank, but lets not go through all that again!!
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Is this structure beibg erected by the same organistation that carried out works on the Wenlock Edge -resulting in several rocks causing the A458 road to be reduced to one way?
When ARE we going to get value for money?
Imagine if goods and services we buy every day were built to the same standards?
Just think – cars with wheels out of alignment, TV’s with wonky screens, computers with software bugs etc etc ….
would we put up with that?
Of course not !!!
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labour ideas like this never work, we need tax cuts to stimulate the economy not communist style statues of bearded marxists all over town, what a waste of my council tax, it makes me mad
down with labour, down with government spending, down with this horrid concrete creature
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What a waste of my money – I want a cash refund!
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I hear the council are planning to give tax refunds in cash to anyone who puts their complaints in writing.
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No doubt the more arty types will turn it into some sort of shrine,you never know that on the seventh friday of the second month of the first year in the third millenium the sun will be in line this carbuncle and the SABC silver plate bought by our money, perhaps it should symbalise just how out of touch the authorities are with real life.
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When i posted my previous comment i was referring to Edward’s comment Paulo, not yours.
I appreciate this is supposed to be related to Quantum Leap and not Theatre Severn but it seems almost every comments page i come across is hijacked to bash theatre severn by someone.
Shrewsbury has needed a new theatre for the past 40 years, i hardly think the two ideas were conceived at the same time.
Theatre Severn and Quantum Leap look nothing alike. Where is the faulty construction at Theatre Severn? They werent built by the same contractor and Quantum Leap is intended to be art. Theatre Severn actually serves a purpose in that it hosts a variety of art in different forms.
Would you rather have kept the Music Hall as it fell into the Square piece by piece..?!
I wonder how many people who criticise it have actually been there……
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” shrewsbury’s most famous son ” Darwin did what most shrewsbury people should do, he left at the earliest possible moment and never returned
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we must stop spend thift councils doing this type of thing, we must privatise more council services and axe many more to cut taxes, labour isnt working, art isnt important
Get Cameron in now and let the tax cuts begin
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Right on. Gracious thanks to all those here who have had their moan and confirmed the mentality of Shrewsbury people as small town. Good job.
“My tax money, my tax money……..blah blah”
This project cost you less than £1 each. Think on.
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