St John's Beacon (Radio City Tower) is a Grade II listed building in the Liverpool local planning authority area, England. First listed on 12 October 2020. Observation tower. 1 related planning application.
St John's Beacon (Radio City Tower)
- WRENN ID
- pitched-gravel-scarlet
- Grade
- II
- Local Planning Authority
- Liverpool
- Constituency
- Liverpool Riverside MP: Kim Johnson (Lab)
- Country
- England
- Date first listed
- 12 October 2020
- Type
- Observation tower
- Address
- St John's Beacon (Radio City Tower), 1 Houghton Street, L1 1RL
- OS grid reference
- SJ 348 903
- Coordinates
- 53.40632, -2.98202
- Source
- Historic England listing
Description
St John's Beacon, also known as the Radio City Tower, is an observation tower built between 1965 and 1969, designed by James A Roberts. It was converted into a radio broadcasting studio in 1999. The tower is made of board-marked in-situ slip-form concrete and has a circular plan. It is located at the junction of the south-east elevation of St John’s shopping precinct and the Playhouse Theatre.
The tower features its own separate foundations and stands on a circular podium that is attached to the St John’s Precinct. It has a tapering cylindrical shaft topped with a crow's nest-like lantern projection, which originally housed a revolving restaurant and viewing platform but is now used as a radio station. The lantern has an upwards-sloping concrete soffit segmented with recessed ribs radiating from the center. It tilts outwards to allow views downwards and is glazed with a band around it displaying the lettering 'RADIO CITY 96.7'. The original rooftop viewing deck has been enclosed to provide additional space for the radio station, featuring continuous glazing around the perimeter. Above the lantern, the shaft ends in a flat top, which is now hidden by a framework that supports telecommunications equipment.
The interior includes a stairwell and two lift shafts. The high-level lantern houses radio studios, a perimeter landing area/corridor, a viewing gallery, and offices on the upper floor, which was formerly the open viewing deck.
Local climate
St John's Beacon (Radio City Tower) sits in a wetter-than-average part of the UK, with an average of 1,080 mm of rain a year. This makes it wetter than 86% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is greater than that of 75% of listed buildings.
It experiences an average of 19 freeze-thaw cycles a year, fewer than 81% of listed buildings. Of these, 9 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.
Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.
More on this building
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- Full EPC report — heating system, energy costs, size, glazing, construction etc.
- No sale records on file
- Related listed building consents — 1 application
- Detailed attributes — period, style, materials, features
- Flood risk assessment
- Radon risk assessment
- Weather exposure and heating demand — rain and frost month by month and year by year, wind direction, solar and humidity
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