As this blogpost touches on issues related to work for my employer, I just want to take the opportunity to make it clear that the views expressed here (and elsewhere on this blog) are my views and not those of my employer. Nor are they the views which are brought to bear in the work which I undertake for my employer, in which I strive to maintain a high degree of professionalism and impartiality. Good? Clear? Now let’s get to the good stuff.
With the Eisteddfod there this year I’ve been increasingly looking at this history of Cardiff Bay, particularly Butetown. I never went to the Bay much when I lived in Cardiff, usually only venturing down when I had company. It was all a bit too generic and expensive. I preferred to stick to the pubs of Roath – the Gower (now gone), the Roath Cottage (ditto), the Crwys, and the Albany. I was aware, because of my knowledge of the place’s history, that there were some grand buildings, but things like the Coal Exchange weren’t exactly worth visiting in the late naughties/early twenty-teens, and many still aren’t. What was there still to be seen? The Norwegian Church and the Peirhead building, fair enough, and the Senedd is always worth a look, but the focus remains on a concreated-over dock basin, a metal dome with two intermingling poems which aren’t the easiest to decipher (yes, I know that’s the point), and a steel and glass shopping/restaurant quarter – not exactly my scene.
Still, looking into it more, the processes by which the Bay has been transformed from a rich industrial built landscape with grand Victorian offices, humble workers’ homes, and huge warehouse into a modern conglomeration of chain restaurants and bars with a capitol building and a musical arts centre are in equal parts fascinating and frustrating. Looking at this process of regeneration, I necessarily view it through the experience of growing up in a town with its own regenerated downtown historic quarter – St. Charles, MO, USA. Comparisons between the two are interesting, particularly given their respective histories, approaches, and outcomes.
The muddy flats beyond Cardiff town remained undeveloped until after the increased industrialisation of the Valleys demanded the building of canals and the establishment of shipping south of the old Town Quay (near where the Tiny Rebel Bar at the end of Womanby Street is now). Some development occurred as the canal and shipping progressed southwards, but the history of Butetown and Cardiff Bay properly begin in 1839 with the establishment of the Bute (West) Docks. Further docks followed, such as the Bute East Dock (now Atlantic Warf), Roath Dock, and, finally, the massive Queen Alexandra Dock in 1907. These in turn prompted not only cranes, canals, railways, warehouses, and graving docks, but also shipbuilders, ship chandlers, pubs, hotels, shops, and houses. As the wealth pouring in grew to almost obscene proportions, many of the humbler dwellings, with their simple cottage or Georgian-esque architecture, were replaced by the ornate structures of the high Victorian, Edwardian, and 1920s and ’30s. For instance, Mount Stuart Square was originally constructed of the simpler two- and three-storey architecture which can still be seen in numbers 20–23 and numbers 58–59, but from the 1880s this was replaced by grander structures, with the original central green space filled by the massive Coal Exchange in 1884–5. However, despite the insane wealth flowing from the juggernaut that was coal in the early-twentieth century, the economy declined dramatically after the World Wars leading to widespread dereliction, but also the rich multiculturalism and nightlife of Tiger Bay (Hilling, 173–85).
The first European to settle at St. Charles, MO, was the French-Canadian hunter Louis Blanchette who built a cabin for himself and his Native American wife on what is now South Main Street. The settlement, established under Spanish authority, was known as Les Petite Cotes until it was re-named San Carlos in 1791 in honour of St Charles Borromeo. The settlement persevered as an important point west of the Mississippi, passing into U.S. possession as part of the Louisiana Purchase in 1803 and serving as an embarkation point for the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Afterwards, settlers from the Kentucky region moved into the area, expanding and reshaping the settlement, followed by German immigrants, especially after 1829 publication of Gottfried Duden’s Report on a Journey to the Western States of North America and the 1833 establishment of the Gießen Auswanderer Gesellschaft (Giessen Emigration Society) encouraged immigration to St. Charles County. When Missouri became a state in 1821, it was decided to build the capitol, Jefferson City, in the centre of the state. While this was being completed, the state government was based in the Peck Bros. store on Main Street, St Charles, from 1821 to 1826. The city of St. Charles continued to expand across the nineteenth century with the impressive brightly-coloured residences, with their verandas, porches, and turrets, throughout ‘Old Town’ St. Charles showing its prosperity. [1]
By the second half of the twentieth century, both Butetown and downtown St. Charles had fallen into decline and both set out to revitalise, with determined efforts to reinvigorate the economy through restoration of historic buildings or else new building projects. They were, of course, not alone in this as many other post-industrial and port cities on both sides of the pond sought to do the same thing, providing a model for emulation. In the United States, historic preservation and regeneration became a greater priority from the 1960s, with the greater availability of public funding and permission for historic rehabilitation and restoration schemes. In Missouri, a series of tools for regeneration were approved in the 1950s, when St. Charles used the Land Clearance for Redevelopment Authority (LCRA) to build the Parkridge Apartments in the 1950s (Elhmann, p. 602).
The LCRA was largely inactive in St. Charles until the late 1960s, however. Nor was St. Charles a particularly blighted area. Indeed it has been estimated that St. Charles County experienced $20m in residential and commercial building in 1965 alone, and from 1965 and 1985 it was one of the fastest growing counties in the U.S. (Elhmann, p. 585) However, the city of St. Charles suffered slightly worse fortunes than the rest of the county, as much of the new building occurred ‘in the county’ (i.e. not in incorporated city limits) or in the newer cities such as St. Peters and O’Fallon. The city of St. Charles also had a general reluctance to compulsory annexation of new built-up areas until the 1970s. Unfortunately, this meant a decline in the commercial prospects of the city as shoppers increasingly forsook Main Street, St. Charles, for the new larger shopping districts, malls, and strip malls constructed off of I-70 or Highway 94 (Ibid, pp. 593–601).
In the 1960s, St. Charles decided to use its historical character as a corrective to this. Clay Street was remained ‘First Capitol Drive’ in 1965 to highlight the city’s claim to fame, and the First Capitol Building itself was renovated/rebuilt and reopened in 1970 (Ehlman, p. 602). In 1966, City Council Ordinance No. 3362 established a ‘Historical Designation’ category for relevant structures, while Ordinance No. 3375 declared downtown to be the ‘St Charles Historic District’ and established a Board of Architectural Review to guide all future construction in the area. In 1967 an application was made for federal regeneration funds and a project was set out including the downtown area, riverfront, and historical district (Kramer and Snider, pp. 1–2). Work began in 1969 on the restoration / renovation of three properties, all on Main Street: the Western House, Farmers Tavern, and Stone Row, with many more structures throughout the area to follow (Memories of Main).
The vision for the area was largely laid out in 1977 in the Historic St. Charles First State Capitol Urban Renewal Project ‘Loan and Grant Application Appendix’. Buildings were classified under four categories – historically significant, architecturally compatible, aesthetically compatible, and noncompatible/substandard – and retained, renovated, restored, or demolished accordingly. Extensive architectural guidelines were produced governing both the restoration of buildings and new construction, to produce a more uniform architecture reflecting the areas historic character. The result is not that all buildings look the same – the ornate marble of the Masonic Lodge at the north end of South Main and the simple stone of Stone Row are definitely different – but newer, twentieth-century renovations to buildings were ‘corrected’ and new builds needed to be sympathetic. Newer buildings, such as petrol stations, were demolished, as were many of the surrounding industrial buildings which had grown up around the railway tracks – not just any historic vision, but a very particular one was in mind. The waterfront, which is very much in the floodplain, was transformed into Frontier Park, with the Historic Katy Depot restored and moved there in 1977 (Memories of Main).
Not all the changes have endured. North Main was transformed into a pedestrianised shopping district, which was fairly unpopular and did not last long. But today downtown St. Charles stands as an outstanding historic district with a wide draw for tourism as well as being a matter of local pride. South Main is populated with small antique, craft, and specialty shops, as well as restaurants, while North Main hosts much of the city’s nightlife, with several bars and nightclubs popular with locals and students at Lindenwood College, although there are currently efforts to curtail the bars. [2] While not pedestrianised, the area is highly pedestrian accessible with a rough brick street controlling and slowing traffic for the safety of visitors and residents.
For all these official efforts, however, the restoration of South Main Street in particular owes much more to the efforts of private citizens, in particular the artist Archie Scott, business and restaurant owner Donna Hafer, and tobacconist John Dengler. These individuals purchased and restored a great number of buildings throughout Main Street, encouraged and advised other home and business owners to do the same, and were vocal advocates to the restoration scheme in general. Because Main Street St. Charles would not have worked without the concerted efforts of residents and community support. The St. Charles Country Historical Society (est. 1956), whose archives are on South Main Street were also at the forefront, and the activities were also promoted in the newsletter the South Main Star. Festivals and events which have since become mainstays in the St. Charles calendar also owe their origins to this period and have served to cement the place of Main Street at the heart of the St. Charles community: The Festival of the Little Hills (originating in 1969 as part of the bicentennial celebrations), Christmas Traditions, and the Fourth of July celebrations on Main Street and in Frontier Park (Memories of Main).
The efforts to revive Cardiff Bay also kicked off in the second half of the twentieth century, but with more of a mixed attitude to historic preservation. Many of the grand Victorian buildings fell into increasing disuse and dereliction across the period and were subsequently demolished, such as Gloucester Chambers at the corner of Mount Stuart Square which was destroyed after the blizzard of 1982. Similarly, much of the industrial apparatus, being largely redundant, was disposed of. The southern end of the Glamorganshire Canal is a park while the Bute West Dock was filled in and built over. Cranes, warehouses, and railway tracks were all destroyed or ripped up to facilitate new builds.
One slight exception was the Bute East Dock, the area around which is now Atlantic Warf. Here, most of the railways, coal tips, warehouses, and other buildings have been removed, the Hills Dry Docks filled in a built over. But the warehouse at the northern end of the docks survived, being transformed into the office of an architectural firm in an award-winning conversion. The Spillers and Baker Factory became apartments (although their mill at the Roath Dock met a less kind fate) and the London and North Western Warehouse is now a hotel. And it is clear this type of conversion of an area was appreciated and viewed as a positive, being awarded the County Councils’ Centenary Award in 1989 (Hilling, 188).
This type of thinking did not extend across the Bay, however. In 1987, several buildings in the area of Bute Street, Bute Place, and Bute Crescent were demolished as part of the development of the Cardiff Bay Link Road. These included the Grade II-listed Mount Stuart Hotel, the 1890s Seamen’s Institute and All Souls Church, the National Union of Seamen’s Maritime Hall , and numbers 63–68 Bute Street.
It is somewhat ironic that it was also in 1987 that the Cardiff Bay Development Corporation (CBDC) was created to facilitate the rejuvenation of the area. Based on Mount Stuart Square, their ambitious plans are laid out in a 1990 ‘Inner Harbour Area Planning Brief, Final Report’ submitted to the CBDC by Benjamin Thompson & Associates, Inc. Their main objectives were to:
- Develop an area in which people wanted to ‘live, work and play’
- Have high standards of quality and design including historic restoration and the establishment of detailed architectural criteria
- To better connect the Bay and the town
- To promote a wide range of job opportunities through mixed of development
- To provide housing for people across the socio-economic spectrum
- And to achieve a reputation for excellence in regeneration.
Interestingly, these goals aren’t a huge distance from the Bute Estate’s original plans for Butetown, with a mix of residential, commercial, industrial, and administrative buildings (Hilling, 184). And what a plan it is. New housing would cater for the projected upscale market but also bore the existing local population in mind. New businesses were to be attracted to the area, but locals were also to be encouraged to maintain a local feel through entrepreneurship. Indeed, benefits for the local community are highlighted throughout, with a stress on open public spaces, greenspace, accessibility to the waterfront, improved schools and community centres, and opportunities for employment and re-training all stressed. In terms of heritage, tourism, and entertainment, the Welsh Industrial and Maritime Museum would play a key role, alongside a new science centre and opera house, with other projected venues including a water hall and aquarium. The plan for Mount Stuart Square was:
to retain in full the dense urban character that exists and has been strengthened with recent improvements [for instance, the work by the CBDC on their own offices at Baltic House] through the use of careful, simple detailing in paving, street furniture, and tree planting, but to enliven the area through the imaginative use of flood lighting. (4.1.1)
At the heart of it all was the waterfront, with the Cardiff Bay Barrage transforming the bay into a giant freshwater lake (which did happen) and the retention of the West Bute Dock Basin as a water-space surrounded by trees, complete with historic ship (which did not happen, it is now Roald Dahl Plass).
But just as a middle and upper class exodus from Butetown to the suburbs of the north in the late nineteenth century leading to a change of character, so to the CBDC’s vision did not exactly go to plan. Problems of funding, changes of government, and realities on the ground all conspired against it, as is clearly seen in the story of why the Wales Millennium Centre is not the Welsh National Opera House. However, there were also apparent changes in vision. The controversial closure of the Welsh Industrial and Maritime Museum to make way for the shopping and restaurant centre Mermaid Quay is a fairly symbolic case in point. Reacting to the news of the closure, then MP for Cardiff North Rhodri Morgan was reported in the Independent as stating,
It beggars belief that we could have got into a situation where for the sake of having a row of upmarket shops, we have sacrificed the Welsh Industrial and Maritime Museum. It is the ultimate step in the yuppification of Cardiff Bay. It extinguishes the memory of what made Wales such a powerful force in the industrialisation of the world for one and a half centuries. It is extremely ironic that not only have railways, mines and iron works been closed in Wales, but we have now closed the museum that commemorates them.
This is a massive and direct departure from the St. Charles approach. As Ann Watkins Hazelwood discussed in the 2013 documentary Memories of Main, in rejuvenation there was a careful and constant balancing act between preservation and commerce with both having to be reeled in somewhat in order to further the historic vision while still making it commercially viable. A focus on smaller, local businesses which fit the needs and character of the area has been essential to the success of Main Street, St. Charles, (and was a prominent aspect of the CBDC’s plan), in contrast to an approach which places emphasis on chain restaurants and stores at the expense of older buildings and local character and history.
And there is some sense of an erasure of the history of Butetown throughout redevelopment, with many of the buildings allowed to continue into a state of dereliction and the removal rather than conversion of many industrial structures. Even the historic Coal Exchange had to be controversially saved by a private company through conversion into a hotel. However, more recently Cory’s Building on Bute Street is being converted into luxury flats, but with support of the Development Bank of Wales. Things like this are encouraging that there may be a future for such buildings and a new interest in sprucing up the historic area, but coming after years of neglect and demolition it is too late for a lot of structures.
Instead of the strict adherence to building in ‘historic’ styles like St. Charles, Cardiff Bay has focused on new buildings in innovative designs, forming a break with the high-Victorian ornamentation of the past. And to be perfectly fair, while I obviously have a preference for the St. Charles approach, there are good arguments on both sides, and from a purely aesthetic point of view the issue is largely a matter of taste. The loss of historic structures and the social and cultural histories they represent is more lamentable, but both the St. Charles and Cardiff approaches have consciously chosen a particular historical narrative to represent, both of which necessarily exclude other histories.
More crucial is how rejuvenation supports and suits the needs of the local community. Unfortunately, this is something I am less qualified to comment on: not being a member of the Cardiff / Tiger Bay community it is not exactly my place to say. But there are some things which do stand out, particularly the destruction of Butetown’s lower-income housing in the 1960s and ’70, and the loss of the nightclubs, music venues, and bars which made Tiger Bay famous, such as the Casablanca Club on Mount Stuart Square, now part of a car park. Whether those communities are now being well served by the chain restaurants and luxury flats which have been the focus of the redevelopment seems somewhat dubious.
Of course, it’s not like the St. Charles approach was without its detractors or victims. Writing in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and Daily Banner News, Fred L. Pratt condemned the plans. [3] In a letter to the Post-Dispatch on 14th September he derided the ‘cool $40,000’ needed to
create a tourist trap out of a handful of semi-historical old buildings on the waterfront, far removed from a nice residential area that has been gerrymandered into the plan to make a nice package. The people living in the area, over 500 families, were not consulted as to their wishes or needs and apparently will not be.
Similarly, on 30th September he sardonically mused
Since our part of town has been established as sub-standard, and by connotation its residents as well, doesn’t it seem strange that it is the city planners who are so enthusiastic about the something for nothing Urban Renewal grant instead of the slum dwellers themselves.
In 1972, a group of around thirty concerned citizens organised a meeting against the plans, most of them owners of properties facing compulsory purchase. The principle speaker at the meeting, attorney Larry Boschert, emphasised two main points: that the City’s financing for the project was unclear, but also that there was inadequate relocation housing for those who would be displaced by the project. [3]
The focus on revitalisation of the downtown area in a way which was overwhelmingly appealing to middle-class sensibilities, and the overwhelming ‘whiteness’ of the plan’s champions, also should be viewed in the context of St. Charles’s contemporary reluctance to allow the construction of social housing, a concern which was almost certainly racially charged. As late as 1973, Parkridge Apartments near Blanchett Park in St. Charles (admittedly built in the ‘50s by the LCRA) remained the only social housing in the county. The majority of residents there had been black since 1960, compounding the local perceived association between social housing and minorities. In that same year, social housing was so woefully inadequate throughout the county that it was estimated that 300 further units were badly needed. When the St John’s AME Church’s attempts to build multifamily housing was voted down by the city council, one resident was described in the Banner-News as opposing it as a ‘poor working man of the white race’ (Ehlmann, p. 556–57). The difference between the City’s desire and ability to revitalise a historical district and its capability in providing adequate social housing to the economically disadvantaged and minorities is striking. Nor is it an issue limited to the revitalisation of St. Charles, as the clearing of the residences and businesses of Wales’s oldest and richest multicultural community in Tiger Bay in the 1960s and ‘70s certainly attests.
Despite their different outcomes, both plans to rejuvenate historical districts have met with difficulties and major drawbacks, but neither has been wholly unsuccessful. While talk of a Welsh Venice were certainly both premature and hyperbolic, Cardiff Bay is a centre of commerce and government, even if it is also a stark illustration of inequality of wealth. But then, when was it not? Dockworkers, sailors, singers, and prostitutes lived within stones’ throws of monstrous nineteenth-century temples to Mammon across its history. Men once sat writing million pound cheques less than a mile from other men doing back-breaking physical labour for the same industry. However, Cardiff Bay has not, in my opinion (and this may be a bit of ‘hometown’ pride), achieved the same success in historical conservation, nor in creating the same type of community events, although it is to be hoped that the current Eisteddfod goes some way in changing that. Because for all the controversy and condemnation there is still community in Butetown, as there ever was, with institutions like the Butetown Community Centre and groups like Tiger Bay and the World eager to foster community spirit and share community stories.
At the end of the day, there are merits to both cities’ approaches, as well as drawbacks, and I think it might be good to see a bit more of St. Charles in Cardiff Bay, and maybe a bit more of Butetown in St. Charles.
[1] For the general history of St. Charles see Hollrah (ed.) History of St Charles County, Missouri (1765–1885) and Ehlman, Crossroads: A History of St. Charles County, Missouri.
[2] The St. Louis Post Dispatch has decided that being GDPR compliant (not stealing and selling your personal data) is just too much of a trouble and have blocked access to their website in Europe, meaning I am admittedly not well informed on this matter. More may be able to be seen here, (although I can’t actually read it, so I don’t know. Open news media, am I right).
[3] St. Charles County Historical Society Archives, MS 3782 LCRA, F2.
Further Reading:
In 2013, the St. Charles Country Historical Society Archives produced a wonderful documentary about the regeneration of South Main Street, entitled, Memories of Main, it is available for purchase from them (and they are brilliant people, so support them by purchasing one!).
The Glamorgan Archives have an excellent blog with many posts about various sites which formerly existed throughout the bay.
There is also information about hundreds of sites throughout Cardiff Bay on the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales’s resource, Coflein.
You can also check out Tiger Bay and the World for images and other resources.
Steve Ehlman, Crossroads: A History of St. Charles County, Missouri, Bicentennial Edition (St. Charles: 2011).
David Hilling, ‘Through Tiger Bay to Cardiff Bay – Changing Waterfront Environment’, Transactions of the Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion (1990)173–191.
Paul R. Hollrah (ed.) History of St Charles County, Missouri (1765–1885), (1997, originally published 1885)
Gerhrdt Kramer and Felix E. Snider, ‘Historic St. Charles First State Capitol Urban Renewal Project Mo. R-93, Part I Loan and Grant Application Appendix’ (Land Clearance for Redevelopment Authority of the City of St Charles, Missouri: 1977). This document is currently being digitized.
Benjamin Thompson & Associates, Inc., ‘Inner Harbour Area Planning Brief, Final Report’ (Cardiff Bay Development Corporation: 1990)
I would particularly like to thank the staff and volunteers of the St. Charles Country Historical Society Archives for all their kind assistance. Seriously people, if you are from St. Charles (or even if you aren’t) support these guys!
Rambles and Studies in Welsh History 