Plymouth Infirmary Presentation

I did my presentation on Plymouth Infirmary, it was built in 1884 and was a part of a very large area called Freedom fields. The part which remains standing is the old court house and prison, the space also had 2 hospitals and an ambulance station. What I like about this mysterious building is it was obviously a very important place in Plymouth. A lot of the army and navy would’ve been treated there. During the Blitz in World War 2 Freedom fields was heavily bombed and due to the amount of damage, most of it was demolished.

The drawings of the building below show it in its full state, the area highlighted in purple is the bit which stands

 

 

 

 

 

 

As I said before the building is a part of a very large area called Freedom fields, the map below shows where they stood with the key on the left hand side. The building which is still standing is in Yellow: (Click to enlarge)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The site is now owned by Aldi, they have owned it for 10 years now and since then have tried to get permission to knock it down to build a new supermarket store on top of it. They haven’t been able to get planning permission there, as there is a strong residential community who reject knocking the building down. However a lot of people have complained to the government about the building, as many people have found children running around on the grounds when the area is obviously not safe. The building is now used mainly by junkies, the site is littered with empty beer bottles, used needles and graffiti, which is another reason why people don’t believe it’s a suitable place for children to be playing on. Since the complaints to the council, they have ordered Aldi to make the area safe. Aldi has responded by boarding up the area so it’s not possible to get, unless someone is making a deliberate effort to get inside.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Herald in Plymouth made a report of the derelict building, and recorded an interesting video of a tour inside which shows how many needles, beer cans and the amount of graffiti on the walls inside, you can view it here:
http://www.thisisplymouth.co.uk/news/work-pledged-eyesore-site/article-1184488-detail/article.html

What I also find quite ironic now, is this building was used as a police headquarters and a hospital where drugs were used strictly for healing and fixing people, where as now, there is still drugs in the building, but they’re used by addicts and people who want to hide from the Police.

Infirmary