The Rubislaw View site is on the north side of Rubislaw Quarry in Aberdeen – and it has been recommended for approval by city planners. Developers Carttera have revealed that they plan to build 245 Build to Rent apartments – a mix of one, two and three-bedrooms, with the tallest building at nine storeys high. Councillors will vote on the planning application today for the £70m development which will take two years to complete.
The new proposals are scaled back from previous proposals in 2018, where the planning application was for 300 apartments and a public promenade. The revisions informed by Aurora Planning include scaling down the building – decreasing its length by 35 metres, its height by 6.8 metres and the area by 480sqm’s, which has reduced the number of Build to Rent apartments on the site but car parking spaces have increased.
The Rubislaw View development is six minutes from the city centre which offers access to restaurants, shopping, bars and key attractions. Resident amenities include a state-of-the-art gym, a public bistro, promenade, concierge service, indoor and outdoor amenity spaces, undercover car parking, car share, electric car charging points, a function room for residents to meet and hire, a walkway with views of the quarry and car club cars.
Carttera will also contribute over £3.3m to pay for affordable housing which will be built elsewhere – because of expected difficulties in maintaining the affordable units within the development.
The design
One of the main design drivers in the creative process was the unique shape of the site. Intentionally avoiding a ‘bar-shaped’ scheme, inspiration was drawn from Scottish landscapes – where the profile of the hills is undulating.
The design of ‘stacking’ the residential units was adopted – and inspired from the blocks of granite cut from the quarry. The result is a stretch of quarried blocks which provide an interesting silhouette, which visually gives the building local distinctiveness.
