Belfast is on the verge of undergoing a huge transformation with numerous "game-changing" developments in the pipeline that could see the city become unrecognisable in the next decade.
While the city centre has been hitting the headlines for all the wrong reasons in recent months with serious issues needing to be tackled, the potential for the city is clear to see.
There are a number of huge developments that have been given the green light and more to come which could help change the fortune of Belfast for generations to come.
Earlier this year ground was broken on the Belfast Transport Hub which, when completed in 2025, will be the largest integrated transport facility on the island of Ireland.
The £200m flagship project, which will be called Belfast Grand Central Station, will replace the existing Europa and Great Victoria Street bus and rail stations.
It will feature 26 bus stands, eight railway platforms, cycle and taxi provisions and the capacity to welcome more people, as well as the Belfast to Dublin Enterprise service running from there.
The project will also include Weavers Cross, a mixed-use development bringing together residential, hotels, office space, retail and hospitality.
Plans are also ongoing for the Waterside development which is set to transform the 16-acre Sirocco site into a life, leisure and workspace haven as well as the controversial ‘Tribeca’ scheme to redevelop 12 acres of Belfast between Royal Avenue and Donegall Street.
"Belfast has the right size city centre, it is a walkable city centre, I think it has huge potential and I think we have a number of really good investments that are going to take place," said Glyn Roberts, Chief Executive of Retail NI.
"Whether it is Ulster University, Sirocco, the Transport Hub, and hopefully we will see Tribeca the Castlebrooke development being able to move forward, so I think there's a lot of potential for Belfast city centre.
"Admittedly there are some short term challenges that we need to address but in the medium to long term I think the prospects for Belfast are very good, I think we do face immediate challenges around cleanliness, about anti-social behaviour but I think all those are solvable and it's something Retail NI and Hospitality Ulster are very much focused on.
"I do think when we do get through the current economic situation, I think Belfast has huge potential to be even looking at the next five to 10 years in the top 10 retail and hospitality destinations in the UK.
"I think that is something that is achievable and something that with the right support Belfast can achieve."
Plenty of work is ongoing via Belfast City Council's Future City Centre programme which looks at ways of supporting the city’s existing retail offer, delivering enhanced connectivity and supporting sustainable and active travel, delivering investment and inclusive economic opportunities and a strong cultural character to provide a distinctly Belfast feel to the city centre.
A spokesperson said it was a multi-faceted approach to supporting the emerging diversification of uses within the city centre and "linked to the longer-term ambitions of the Belfast Agenda and Belfast City Centre Regeneration and Investment Strategy".
Looking at some of the other upcoming projects in the city, the £100m Belfast Stories development is one of seven projects included in the Belfast Region City Deal tourism and regeneration plan.
Due to open in 2028, elements of the new visitor attraction will be housed in the listed art deco former Bank of Ireland building on Royal Avenue, preserving our existing built heritage and delivering a key regional tourism location, touching also on the city centre vibrancy pillar.
Plans are also progressing to redesign the Cathedral Gardens into a new city park and consider how to better connect this area to the new city park at City Quays.
On a smaller scale, CastleCourt's plans for the old Debenhams site were given the go-ahead and will see the space turned into a cinema and a family entertainment and adventure venue. Omniplex Cinema Group will occupy 30,000 sq ft with luxury cinema brand "The Avenue" with the family entertainment scheme taking up 50,000sq ft.
Work is underway and it is hoped the space will open in December 2022.
Chris McCracken, Managing Director of Linen Quarter BID, said: "I think that narrative about how bad the city is has played out its course to a certain extent. Clearly, there are issues that need to be resolved but the overall context for Belfast is very positive. It is a city with a really bright future.
"In our area by far and away our biggest, and probably the biggest for Belfast and the whole of Northern Ireland, is the Transport Hub and Weavers Cross. The good thing about this project is, it's underway already and sometimes you talk about these projects and nothing happens for years, but for this project the cranes are there, there's spades in the ground and work is underway. You can start to see things emerge."
"The bit the train station currently sits on is going to be completely redeveloped into Weavers Cross, a 1.2m sq ft of development space right in the heart of the city centre," he added.
"We can not start anything on that until 2025 when Grand Central Station is due to open so it will be a few years before we see anything there but there will be some sign work and commissioning contractors over the next couple of years. By 2025/2026 we will start to see work on Weavers Cross.
"This will probably take 10-12 years to build out and it will be a mixed use development, residential, hotels, office space, maybe some retail, restaurants, hospitality, public realm. It is quite a big space to do a lot of interesting things on and it will increase the vitality of the city.
"With it being right beside the new train station that will make it very attractive to foreign direct investment and indigenous developers alike. We can anticipate that area will support things like technology investment and the growth of the technology sector in Belfast which is another big story for the city. We have come from nowhere to have fantastic technology companies all over the city."
Translink said it was a "hugely important NI Executive Flagship Project and a key driver for economic growth that will help Belfast and Northern Ireland thrive as a modern, competitive, and confident region".
A spokeswoman added: "It will improve connectivity for everyone in Northern Ireland and beyond and act as a highly impressive gateway.
“With the added benefits of active travel options, it will also play a major part in tackling the climate emergency, reduce congestion for better air quality, leading to a healthier, smarter and more sustainable city for everyone”.
For the Linen Quarter BID, they want to ensure when Grand Central Station opens those using the hub can come out and an enhanced public realm scheme can connect it to Blackstaff Square behind the Crown bar, an area Mr McCracken admits was once a "horrible piece of land".
The vision is that it becomes a more vibrant hospitality hub for the city off the back of the new transport hub opening.
He also highlighted the importance of the city concentrating on becoming more cycle friendly.
"Most cities across the UK and Europe are investing heavily in cycle lanes and transforming urban mobility, we can't have this situation where we are having cars clogging up the city centre," he said.
"The solution is to reduce cars in the city centre and replace that with other forms of urban mobility and that will include the North-South Glider which does have money in the City Deal for and will include more cycle lanes which we don't have money for."
He is pushing plans for a cycle lane linking the Gasworks with the new train station and also pushing through with previous plans for a foot and cycle bridge connecting the Gasworks and Ormeau Park.
Linen Quarter BID is also set to move its efforts down to Shaftesbury Square, an area previously known to locals as the Golden Mile but which now has become run down which many derelict buildings.
"Fifteen years ago there was a Michelin star restaurant there with Cayenne and that was the centre of nightlife and all the rest 20 years ago and that has all fallen apart and one of the reasons for that was because things gravitated towards the Cathedral Quarter but partly there was no voice for the area," said Mr McCracken.
"No one to say how do we improve this area and make it better. That is what BIDs do. At our next vote in January we are moving down to Shaftesbury Square, we do not cover it at the moment but we are going to move down and become the voice for Shaftesbury Square, Dublin Road, Great Victoria Street and bring some of those improvements and make a difference.
"At the moment everybody is talking about Great Victoria Street and just how awful it is, walk down that lower part and it's just completely derelict, it's terrible. In five years time, we will make a difference to that area, we are not going to completely transform it but we will make a difference."
Back in the Linen Quarter, the next five years will see the opening of the flagship Belfast headquarters for Kainos on the site of the Movie House cinema on the Dublin Road. Mr McCracken said this was a major success story along with the refurbishment of the BBC building which would include a public plaza.
One of the big problems blighting Belfast has been the empty shops and in July of this year, the council launched a £700,000 Vacant to Vibrant city centre capital grant scheme which aims to bring vacant units in the city centre back into use and rethink how empty premises can be repurposed and reimagined for new uses.
Mr Roberts, of Retail NI said: "Instead of looking at these derelict, empty spaces as the failures of yesterday, look at them as the businesses of tomorrow. We have to change that narrative, change that conversation and really ask ourselves what are we going to do with this empty space.
"I think joint up thinking is required about how we develop that empty space, is it going to be for more retail, more residential, but I think we need that joined up approach in terms of addressing the dereliction, the empty shops and if we had that joint up conversation between government, property, investors, I really think we can turn the situation around."He said one of the big challenges is how do we create space and encourage and support more independent retailers in Belfast city centre.
"I think Belfast city centre has a very good retail offering, in many respects you have the same big names that you can get in any major city in the UK," he said.
"I think what we want to see is more independent retailers locating in the city centre and it's going to require help from the government because one of the barriers to independent retailers locating in the city centre is things like rent and rates.
"We have to create hubs where we can get those independent retailers where they can offer something really different and distinctive in terms of that retail offer. We have been talking to some of the developers, whether it is Castlebrooke or Sirocco to say how do we create space, how do we help those independent retailers to locate in the city centre."
Another big change for Belfast will also be work to get more people living in the city centre, which has been described as a game-changer.
"I think it is about them all coming together, in one sense Belfast city centre needs a downtown strategy because I think as we see all of those developments take place you will see more and more people living in the city centre and that will change the city centre from a 9-5 type thing to a 24-hour economy almost where you have people living there and I think that will change the city centre very much for the better as well," said Mr Roberts.
"The council's ambitious plans for increasing the number of people who live in the city centre, that is an important part of it as well, that we see more and more people live there and not just single millennials but also families.
"We have always been big supporters of public transport, we want to see public transport being people's first option rather than last, we are greatly encouraged by the Transport Hub. Also, I think once we see Ulster University move fully into their Belfast campus that is going to be a game-changer as well."
