Polo crushing

The life of London buildings seems to be getting shorter. Last year saw approval to demolish the buildings 4 and 5 of the Broadgate development, designed by Peter Foggo, completed in 1988.  Now there's approval to take down Marco Polo House, on the Queenstown Road in Battersea, designed by Ian Pollard and completed in 1987.

Marco Polo House's original tenants were British Satellite Broadcasting (Marco Polo was one of their satellites) and upstairs was The Observer. I went on tour with BBC engineering and property types, during the brief period in 1990 when BSB (remember "squarials" ?) was broadcasting, and The Observer was being edited by Donald Trelford.  Our engineers poo-poohed the quality of the tv studios and lights, but we were all taken with the catering at the Observer. It was our first sighting of cashless payment via staff cards automatically loaded with a subsidy, to be used in a small but really posh staff restaurant, to counter the perceived lack of fine dining in the area.