JUST over a month old and already it's a ubiquitous feature on Scotland's physical and media landscape, a flashing, shiny beacon of our love of entertainment and symbol of a push to prosper.
Alternatively, Glasgow's £130 million Hydro Arena is another illustration of the gulf between the have and have-nots, a publicly funded blow to the city's legendary grassroots music scene sponsored by an arch villain in the cost-of-living crisis and a powderkeg of politics about to ignite.
The SSE Hydro has had a troubled birth, long before disputes with contractors threatened its delivery timetable. To pay for it, the venue's owner, the SECC, borrowed £40m from the city council via a "complex and creative" property transaction. Insiders do not expect the public purse ever to be fully reimbursed.
Its early success, though, is beyond dispute. Sell-out draws like Rod Stewart undoubtedly boost the hospitality sector and parts of the night-time economy, acts who have outgrown or no longer see the SECC as fit for purpose now have a reason to come north of the Border and the Still Game stage shows promise to be a phenomenon.
But music industry sources say £40 a ticket for Vampire Weekend, Queens of the Stone Age or the Arctic Monkeys is £40 not spent on a handful of gigs by emerging bands in smaller venues.
What little spare cash there is for leisure spend is being sucked up increasingly by the Hydro to the detriment of city centre businesses, it is claimed. The entertainment equivalent of a thriving out-of-town mall, it's a simple case of economic displacement where independent operators lose out to a competitor with an unfair advantage.
Like other totemic new buildings in Glasgow, some also question just who the Hydro is for. Estimates put the potential impact on the local economy at £131m a year but in the meantime elected representatives continue to explain to citizens the 300% rise in the cost of an OAP day centre meal, education cuts, closure of facilities for people with learning disabilities and hikes to parking charges.
And in a world where energy giants are public enemy number one, it's legitimate to question the role of sponsor SSE. As it increases domestic bills by 8.2%, how many parents are under pressure to switch to it so their children get first bite at Hydro tickets 48 hours before public sale?
This week SECC director Keith Wyness stepped down. Chairman (and former SSE deputy chairman) Sir Ian Grant will soon follow suit. With both gone and battles over pay between the SECC and its major shareholder, Glasgow City Council, again on the horizon, boardroom bloodshed and manoeuvrings in early 2014 are inevitable.
It's an open secret SECC chief executive John Sharkey, highly regarded in the corporate and events worlds, wants the Hydro to be his platform for pastures new. In the meantime its rocky delivery might cause some turbulence with the ruthless political machine at shareholders HQ, Glasgow City Chambers.
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