That done, I cycle (still on the path) to the Wavertree Park entrance at the corner of Botanic Road. This marks the beginning of the stretch of condemned Victorian houses, properties that are at the centre of recent Edge Lane Project controversy. Two weeks ago, local resident Mrs. Pascoe hit the national newspapers with her brave attempt to stop the demolition of these once splendid residences.

Many have been compulsory purchased and house after house is boarded up and ready to be raised to the ground. As you stand and look at these buildings it is hard to comprehend the fate that awaits them. I can’t comment on the interiors, but externally, most still have the original features – cast ironwork and inlayed decorative brickwork – period features that cost a fortune in today’s market. Some of the properties overlook the walled Botanic Garden of Wavertree Park, a registered English Heritage Grade II listed Park. Professor Tony Bradshaw, a highly acclaimed botanist and citizen of Liverpool, regards the Botanic Gardens in Edge Lane as 'an overlooked jewel within Liverpool, and a piece of garden history unmatched elsewhere in Britain' (The Wavertree Society Newsletter 146).
This stretch of the city surely had all the trappings to be a conservation area?
But instead has been allowed to fall into a slash and burn site.

There’s a strong case for the demolition of these buildings and a strong case against. I know what I’d like to see, but I’m an observer and a recorder, and an outsider. Edge Lane NEEDS regenerating – it’s an eye-saw to the extent that it’s depressing –
It is the primary artery route into the city, and it has looked run down and neglected for as long as I can remember – at least 18 years.

As I slowly cycle by past splendour, I clock a woman with a clipboard. I make my way to her as she frenetically canvasses for signatures.
“Is your petition to stop the demolition?” I ask
“NO!!! WE want these rat infested places to be knocked down. They’re building a dual carriageway and luxury apartments and that bloody Pascoe woman is trying to stop it. She’s not even from here. We’ve got to live with these. I own a house just down there and I want to live somewhere nice.”
She stops 2 blokes –
“Sign this – it’s to get those places knocked down”
Without hesitation they sign.
“Yeh, we want rid”
Then a woman pushing a pram…
“I’ll sign – I’m sick of the bloody rats, I caught one yesterday trying to get up mw drainpipe. I was outside hanging me washing. It’s those rat infested places that’s the problem they need to come down”
The lady with the clipboard had no time to speak to me – not if I wasn’t going to sign. Franticly she ran down the street hollering after a man stood at the traffic lights…

And I’m left wondering about the impact the dual carriageway will have on her, and the lady with the pram, and all the others that live on the north side of the carriageway. A four lane highway with a tree lined boulevard in the central reservation will physically divide a community, separating the north side from the south side, and cut those on the north side off from the “jewel within Liverpool… unmatched elsewhere in Britain”

There are two sides to every coin….
The Edge Lane regeneration scheme is causing a great deal of anger and unrest – to say the least.
One local M.P. Jane Kennedy (Labour) has described what is happening as "social cleansing".
The voices of people like Jane Kennedy and Mrs Pascoe have had an impact – and the demolition of the Victorian properties has been interrupted under the Human Rights Act.
“Prescott's 'social cleansing' faces court challenge”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/03/25/nprezza25.xml

So, there’s a bit of a battle about to begin on Edge Lane.

Liverpool Council’s neglect of this area in the past by has created a problem inherited by the current Council officers. As a consequence they are in a bit of a pickle – damned if they do and damned if they don’t. The compound effects of a history of neglect and the pressure of 2008 'City of Culture', appears to have resulted in hasty decision making, and a lack of meaningful community consultation – evidenced in a petition to save the Victorian houses and a counter petition to demolish them.

“Q. Why does Liverpool Land Development Company think that houses need to be knocked down to regenerate the area?
Liverpool Land Development Company appreciates that many houses in the Edge Lane West area are much loved family homes and that it will be a difficult time for the families who need to move as a result of the changes. However, many of the properties in this area have suffered decades of neglect. The plans for the regeneration of the Kensington area have evolved as a result of extensive consultation and engagement with the local community who have worked tirelessly to devise solutions to the problems which the area currently faces. The current proposals to demolish properties are part of wider, long term plans devised by the community to restructure their area while at the same time retaining and building upon the strong sense of community that exists. Along with demolitions and new house building many existing properties in the area are to be retained and refurbished.” http://www.edgelane.com/faqs/faqs.asp

If you want to know more – just google 'Edge Lane' and enter the labyrinth of debates….
And if you are curious to know how the new Edge Lane will look, …
http://www.edgelane.com/flythrough/flythrough.asp for the fly through aerial perspective of the new improved edge lane

The speed of regeneration within certain areas of this city is frightening. The regeneration ‘speak’ is laced with lots of ‘spin’ and when you read about the projects underway, planned, or nearing completion, it all sounds great.
But in just 7 weeks of cycling around Liverpool, I feel compelled to report that it appears to be very much politically and economically led, with little true regard for anything else.
Garston, Edge Lane, Cressington Heath, the disused airfield, and the Baltic Triangle are just a few examples.

Since I began liverpoolwastelands I have read more regeneration and planning papers than I care to recall. They all make claims about the social and environmental benefits, and the word ‘consultation’ seems to appear in virtually every paragraph.
But sadly, the more I read, and the more I meet and talk to people, the more I am finding it increasingly difficult to marry the words written about each scheme to the actual places – the social and the ecological landscapes. There appears to be nothing organic about this renaissance. Not from where I am sat on my bicycle seat in the city streets.