But both these projects have excelled and more than prove the point - well designed and planned new buildings can provide a real focus for regeneration in areas which have been rapidly losing hope. In Walsall the takings of the shops next door to the gallery have increased dramatically and evening events in the gallery have lured people away from the multiplexes they had been channeled towards, and back to the town centre. The result is social and economic regeneration, and a reduction of crime. Peckham Library has also produced dramatic results. The figures for the first six months of the new library compared to the two closed libraries it replaced show that annual visits are up from 171,000 to 450,000 and loans from 80,000 to approximately 340,000.
Local people are proud of their new building and make the most of it.
Wembley can produce the same effect, and without the complex of exhibition centres and hotels which have muddled the proposal latterly. The Peckham and Walsall buildings were realised because there was a simple and energetic vision behind them. This is exactly what Wembley had initially and now needs to regain. The government and the Football Association must not to lose sight of the vibrant and purposeful brief which initiated the project. If we look at recent experience of building football stadiums elsewhere, there does not seem to be a good reason why a new stadium at Wembley should cost 600m.