Housing giant in plan for Weavers’ Triangle (From Lancashire Telegraph)

Weavers' triangle? Examine a very small part of Euclidean geometry then re-apply.

This is a really sustainable forward looking project and is something Burnley should be rightly proud of. They're managing to retain their heritage whilst maintaining a practical use for it. These old mill buildings have huge potential - vast spaces, solidly built with huge windows to ensure maximum light and built in one of the greatest periods of innovation the world's ever seen. I only wish Blackburn would follow Burnley's lead - mills are being lost at an alarming rate in Blackburn and being replaced by corrugated sheds that are completely without character. It doesn't help with having an empty buildings tax - it's cheaper for an owner of an empty mill to demolish it than retain it due to this tax that was introduced in 2008.

An article from the Financial Times describes how property landlords have been unhappy about the tax since 2008 – just before the downturn – when the then Labour government scrapped the 50 per cent relief on rates for owners of empty buildings.

They were further antagonised when, in the 2011 Budget, the coalition reduced the threshold at which a building was exempt for two years, from a ratable value of £18,000 to only £2,600 (even though the Tory party criticised the tax vehemently while in opposition).

Justine Greening, now a Treasury minister, said in 2009 that “thousands” of buildings had been demolished by owners keen to escape the levy, according to data that showed 8,900 business premises had disappeared from the official government property list.

The British Property Federation, which represents landlords, has been campaigning relentlessly against the levy, saying it is no fault of theirs if buildings have fallen empty during the downturn.

The BPF launched a petition this month calling for a reinstatement of the £18,000 threshold, saying the changes had been deeply unfair and had caused the demolition of “millions of square feet of property”. Liz Peace, chief executive of the BPF, called the levy a “tax on hardship” that had damaged the wider economy.

So lets scrap the empty buildings tax before we lose every old empty building.

Joseph O'M wrote:
This is a really sustainable forward looking project and is something Burnley should be rightly proud of. They're managing to retain their heritage whilst maintaining a practical use for it. These old mill buildings have huge potential - vast spaces, solidly built with huge windows to ensure maximum light and built in one of the greatest periods of innovation the world's ever seen. I only wish Blackburn would follow Burnley's lead - mills are being lost at an alarming rate in Blackburn and being replaced by corrugated sheds that are completely without character. It doesn't help with having an empty buildings tax - it's cheaper for an owner of an empty mill to demolish it than retain it due to this tax that was introduced in 2008.

An article from the Financial Times describes how property landlords have been unhappy about the tax since 2008 – just before the downturn – when the then Labour government scrapped the 50 per cent relief on rates for owners of empty buildings.

They were further antagonised when, in the 2011 Budget, the coalition reduced the threshold at which a building was exempt for two years, from a ratable value of £18,000 to only £2,600 (even though the Tory party criticised the tax vehemently while in opposition).

Justine Greening, now a Treasury minister, said in 2009 that “thousands” of buildings had been demolished by owners keen to escape the levy, according to data that showed 8,900 business premises had disappeared from the official government property list.

The British Property Federation, which represents landlords, has been campaigning relentlessly against the levy, saying it is no fault of theirs if buildings have fallen empty during the downturn.

The BPF launched a petition this month calling for a reinstatement of the £18,000 threshold, saying the changes had been deeply unfair and had caused the demolition of “millions of square feet of property”. Liz Peace, chief executive of the BPF, called the levy a “tax on hardship” that had damaged the wider economy.

So lets scrap the empty buildings tax before we lose every old empty building.

It's a bit disappointing that you have read this pretty mundane story and tried to turn it into a Burnley versus Blackburn issue. The 'Burnley Triangle' has been a project that's been ongoing for some years and recent visits by various members of the royal family have helped to raise the profile of what has been achieved there, however what you fail to appreciate is that 100 years ago there was very little productive commercial activity being undertaken in larger north west towns (Blackburn, Burnley, Oldham, Rochdale etc) outside of the cotton industry because of the favourable geographic and climatic conditions. Because of that, these towns had literally hundreds of buildings that housed such businesses and they were generally designed and built in a similar style and served their respective communities well whilst 'cotton was king'. Unfortunately, as we all now know, pressures from overseas where cotton production could be undertaken at a fraction of the cost of that in the UK led to the demise of the industry here and our mills closed down over a period of time leaving us with a legacy of old buildings that reflected our industrial heritage.

The point that I am making and the point that you fail to appreciate in your Burnley Vs Blackburn point-scoring endeavours is that if these buildings were of any architectural or historical interest they would be protected by 'listing' and English Heritage and other interested parties would prevent their demolition.

In terms of the economic and commercial prospects for a town's future in the 21st century I would far rather be carrying out business in a town whose infrastructure comprised of modern, compliant and fit for purpose commercial premises than one where the main hope for future economic growth is based upon a sentimental and rather deluded expectation that a few old buildings sympathetically restored are going to provide sufficient jobs/ money to enable it to develop long-term without relying on vast amounts of tax-payers money to support the residents who are not in productive employment.