Consultation on Dundee Eden Project underway

The Eden Project’s plans to create a new site in Dundee have been set in motion, with a formal public consultation underway.

The Cornwall-based environmental charity has sent a proposal of application notice to Dundee City Council to build an outpost on the site of the city’s former gasworks.

A planning application is due to be submitted in the autumn following a consultation period this summer, including three in-person public meetings.

The Eden Project says the planned venue will offer exhibits, live performances, learning and immersive experiences alongside “world-class horticulture”.

Located beside the River Tay, less than a mile from the V&A Dundee museum, it is intended to contribute to the regeneration of the city’s waterfront.

The project is projected to attract more than 500,000 visitors a year and generate £27m of economic impact for the region annually.

In May 2021, the Eden Project signed a memorandum of understanding with the site’s owners – the energy companies National Grid and SGN – to explore converting it.

The work would include converting the existing gasholder, demolishing other buildings and building a pedestrian bridge. The Eden Project also says it sees potential to create walled gardens from the site’s tall brick walls.

Rachel Sayers, partner at the project’s lead architects Feilden Clegg Bradley Studios, said the scheme would “enable social and economic regeneration”, using an approach which will restore biodiversity and reuse materials.

Darren Hoare, the Eden Project’s head of programme delivery, said: “We continue to be bowled over by the enthusiasm for this project from the people of Dundee and we’re now ready to have a full conversation with the city to embed their thoughts and aspirations for the project into the designs we submit in the planning application later this year.”

The Eden Project is partnering on the venture with Dundee City Council, the Northwood Charitable Trust and the University of Dundee.

In May last year, the partners together contributed £7.6m to fund the scheme’s previous phase, which included detailed design and development and preparing for the planning application.

The Eden Project also has planned new sites in a range of other locations including Morecambe, Foyle and Portland in the UK, as well as international venues such as Australia, Colombia and China.

Last year it emerged that the planned Eden Project Qingdao was running three years behind schedule. According to the Eden Project website, the £150m venue is due to open this year.

Since opening in 2001, the original Eden Project site in Cornwall has received more than 22 million visitors.

But in May, the charity announced it would be making up to 20 staff members redundant, following a previous round of job cuts in 2020.