A city councillor called on the ruling administration to ditch the £25 million Union Terrace Gardens “vanity project”.
LDA Design unveiled its designs for the park in back in 2016, which included water features, a golden “halo” suspended above the central grass area, shops and cafes in the arches and community gardens.
But yesterday an impassioned Midstocket and Rosemount SNP member Bill Cormie called the designs “the poorest I’ve ever seen”.
The SNP and Liberal Democrat groups put forward alternative £3.2million proposals for the sunken Victorian gardens which would have vastly scaled down on the ambitious designs.
It is unclear what the final costs for the project will be and a completion date has been pushed back to next summer.
Mr Cormie said: “This is one of the poorest planning applications I’ve ever seen. We haven’t seen a business plan so we don’t know what the final costs will be or how it will draw people into the city.
“We can have a saving here of £24million so I call on the administration to drop this Union Terrae Gardens vanity project.”
But administration members defended the vigorously defended the proposals.
Council co-leader Douglas Lumsden said the project would be “vital” for city centre regeneration.
He said: “Union Terrace Gardens (is) an integral piece of the city centre masterplan jigsaw, and will fall into place this year as we make a leap forward in the bold and inspiring vision for the heart of Aberdeen.”
