Heart of city regeneration must begin

Ceremonial it may have been, but the sight of a spade in the ground at Aberdeen’s most overdue building site is nevertheless a very welcome heart.

Evidence of a promised cultural renaissance of the Granite City is starting to be seen at many points across the map.

Top acts have returned to the revitalised Music Hall, the new-look art gallery is poised to open its doors and work to restore Provost Skene’s House as a public treasure has begun.

Add in the vibrant, expanding backdrop of Nuart and the imminent opening of P&J Live, and the pieces of the jigsaw are starting to form a picture of a place on the up.

That there remains a Union Terrace Gardens-shaped gap in the unfinished puzzle is source of regret and frustration among rightly impatient residents.

It lies, geographically and emotionally, at the centre of the whole project.

But as well as being its heart, bitter experience over a decade or more of dispute and delay has also singled it out as the ambitious masterplan’s Achilles heel.

No surprise, given the history, that the public should be deeply sceptical that the expensive saga will ever reach a satisfactory end.

That is why it is crucial that there are no more delays, that the real work follows quickly on from the symbolic and taxpayers get to see things taking shape.

“The public should be sceptical that the saga will ever reach a satisfactory end”