Hotel Ronaldo and 24 years of scaffolding

On Thursday, I came up the steps of Empire Exchange after perusing the little novelties and knick-knacks it peddles down below Newton Street, off Piccadilly Gardens. As I came out into the midday sun I squinted up at an advertising hoarding fathoms high and burning deep vermillion. In bold black lettering I was confronted with that timeless question: “how much do you believe in chicken?”

The hoarding on the corner of Newton Street and Piccadilly stretches 14 metres high and 35 metres across, spanning a complex of scaffolding topped with light fixtures so the likes of KFC, Rolex and Land Rover can market to passersby deep into the night. It covers a section of the pavement below, though it’s rare you see anyone walking beneath it; it feels more sensible (and hygienic) to walk around or cross the road entirely.

The scaffolding hugs an old Victorian building — 67 Piccadilly — that was built as a warehouse in 1841. A few days ago, a Reddit post went semi-viral, celebrating not the building’s 185th birthday but the 21st birthday of the scaffolding around it. “Erected in 2005 because the building was deemed 'unsafe' by the council”, the post read. The scaffolding was actually erected in 2002.

I wanted to understand how a building in central Manchester could be left wrapped in scaffolding for over two decades. So I fired off an email to the council asking what it was that it was that rendered 67 Piccadilly so unsafe as to warrant its tomb of steel bars. 

Which is how it began. It turns out, the council said, there wasn’t actually any indication the building was currently unsafe, or at least, posed any risk to the public. “There’s be(en) no live safety risks reported at the property since a fire in 1998,” a spokesperson said. “Although scaffolding is around the building there's nothing current to suggest the building is unsafe.” So here’s a building, 185 years old, that the council says poses no risk to the public but has been clad in scaffolding for 24 years. For what reason? To advertise chicken tenders?

Over the last few days, the mystery of Piccadilly’s perennial scaffolding has unravelled like a medieval scroll. I don't claim to be its chief scribe, or even the most authoritative. It seems that no one can seem to agree on the issue of this scaffolding — whether it should be up at all, whether the building should come down, or whether the ads, pulling in nearly £2 million this year alone, are even allowed. 

And oh yeah, this also involves Cristiano Ronaldo.