When Plymouth City Council unveiled its £3 million Civic Square regeneration plans in 2022, residents were promised more than new paving slabs.
The council’s glossy visuals showed a restored pond improving biodiversity, iconic seating brought back to life, flagpoles reinstated, and new trees planting breathing life into the heart of the city.
Three years on, the reality is starkly different. The pond lies drained and fenced off behind metal barriers. The Hoopla seating is gone, the flagpoles have not returned, and the much-touted biodiversity works have yet to materialise.
Instead, visitors to the city centre are greeted by a miserable empty concrete shell, car parking bays and a Beryl bike dock.
More than 800 thousand pound of High Street Heritage Action Zone (HSHAZ) funding went directly into the Civic Square, with over 2 millon pound of the fundns designed to revitalise historic city centres spent on shopfront cleaning and work on New George Street and Royal Parade.
Many are left wondering why the promised pond repairs and biodiversity measures were abandoned, and where exactly the rest of the money went.
The council themselves have admitted that rising construction costs forced it to strip back on their original aspirations.
In its response to Plymouth Plus, a spokesperson said the scheme had been “carefully reviewed” and that expensive elements such as pond repairs were removed once a leak was discovered.
No breakdown has been provided showing precisely how the £1.25m funding was allocated. No date has been given for when or by whom the decision to abandon the pond, Hoopla seating and flagpoles was made. And no guarantee has been offered that the Civic Square will ever receive the upgrades residents were promised in 2022.
Campaign group STRAW say it’s another example of the council’s promises failing to match the reality on the ground. A spokesperson told us:
"As usual, it appears that the reality of one of PCC's public realm projects has not lived up to the computer generated visuals we were shown.
"How disappointing that car parking and the failing Beryl bike project were prioritised over trees and flower beds, and even over a landmark as popular as the Civic Square pond."
The Civic Square’s pond was once envisioned as a centrepiece of Plymouth’s post-war modernist design but it now stands as a fenced off hazard with its infrastructure crumbling beneath it. The council admits it doesn’t know how much it will cost to repair or where the money would even come from.
For now, residents are left with the sight of mental fencing, bare concrete, and unanswered questions. The council says the measures cut from the project remain and that “long-term aspirations should a suitable project and funding arise”.
For many Plymothians, this is another case of big promises, glossy computer generated images, and a city centre that simply does not match up to the price which we are all paying.
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