The City of London has been a thriving financial and commercial centre for at least 1,000 years, far longer than any of its rivals, and it is still ahead of the game. So does it need to emulate Hong Kong, Dubai and even New York in the race for the skies?

The City is heavily handicapped by the height limit of 1,000ft set by the Civil Aviation Authority to avoid creating hazards to aircraft flying over London into Heathrow and City airports. As a result London cannot begin to rank in any league of the world’s tallest buildings.

The Prince of Wales hit a nerve when he talked in the early 1980s of the City’s “downtown stumps”. The City towers of the Sixties and Seventies, with the exception of Commercial Union and the somewhat glitzy Nat West Tower, were stodgy fare.

The Gherkin has changed that. It has given the Square Mile a landmark that almost everybody instantly warms to, which adds interest to the skyline from almost every viewpoint and shows the value of giving a head to an outstanding architect such as Lord Foster of Thames Bank.

The “Cheese Grater” in Leadenhall Street by Lord Rogers of Riverside should look equally dramatic. The Rogers practice’s latest City buildings, notably the Lloyds Register of Shipping, have brought a new lightness and transparency to the design of office blocks, as well as vibrant, uplifting colour. Renzo Piano’s Spike on the South Bank is likely to have a still more ethereal quality, although it may intrude uncomfortably on the Tower of London.

What the City needs to beware of is a plethora of gimmicky towers that lack elegance and grace. One main advantage in building tall is that it should take pressure off the City’s diminished stock of historic buildings as well as its highly vulnerable conservation areas.

The City of Westminster has some 12,000 listed buildings, while the City has just 590 – alarming, given that this is the true historic core of the capital. After the losses of the Blitz and the careless demolitions of the Sixties and Seventies City planners need to place a high value on ancient alleys that provide lively street life. The Mayor has taken a carefree attitude towards London’s all too few protected vistas. It is vital that high rise continues to be kept away from St Paul’s and that new development in the City is of first-rate quality by first-rate architects.

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