Disappearing Dundee: Menzieshill multi's

Decided to add a daylight shot to my disappearing Dundee project. I know it's not the best picture in the world (i left on AV instead of TV and aperture was too low), and that other blippers might find this boring, but I'm actually enjoying cataloging these things that are disappearing and doing some research about their history etc

This time the subject is the Multis at Menzieshill.

Originally 5 blocks, built in 1963 by Crudens, there's now just two remaining. They are pretty close to Ninewells Hospital, so the last three were slowly pulled down by a giant grabber. Not sure if these two, the furthest away are going to be blown up. Doesn't look like it so far, as there's none of the usual demolished walls that you associate with a blow out, so I'm hopeful i can get a blip of the demolition in progress ;)

I'm fascinated by the history of 60s era buildings. People were genuinely pleased to get one of these new council houses, and were really proud of the area, right through the 60's and 70's. Then, in the early 80s when people started loosing their jobs and the factories etc in Dundee started to close, everything seems to have gone to S**t to the point that people no longer want to live in Multis. Well that's my take and experience of it as someone who lived through the 70's and 80s in council housing as a child.

There used to be only a handful of truly bad council estates in Dundee, and you knew what to expect and where to avoid. Now, the bad apples are mixed throughout the city, bringing a lot of the areas down.

I found this paper interesting reading, especially the money aspects. Each time a Multi is blown up i say to my wife that surely there's a better way, like renovating and using them as student flats, cheap accommodation for low paid workers like nurses etc. The authors findings back that up. It costs less to renovate than it does to demolish. The only reason Councils demolish is because the money doesnt come out of their budgets, but the Scottish Government. Typical.

I stumbled across a site showing old photographs of Dundee, and there's also a video clip of this area in the 60s from one of the multis.

Another thing i found is that The Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland appears to have catalogued a lot of buildings and has some pictures, so at least in the future people can see what areas were like.