On display
were 4 Bays Destinations. These are
identified as the first of 7 Destinations to be tackled:
· Bays Waterfront Promenade – takes in
the Bank Street and Blackwattle Bay foreshore, including the Sydney Fish
Markets. Basically providing a
continuous link from Pyrmont to the Glebe Foreshore foreshore walkway (although
it seems to miss the gap between the Hansons site and the end of the Glebe
walkway).
· Bays Market District – Also
encompasses Blackwattle Bay around to the Glebe Island Bridge (but excludes the
bridge abutment) at the end of Bank Street.
Basically focussed on the SFM but proposing fresh food markets and
outlets along BW Bay foreshore. Hidden
in the talks was reference to some residential which we assume will pay for the
public works. See Sunday’s Sun-Herald
article on one Grand Project with a 32-storey residential tower.
· White Bay Power Station – takes in
the heritage buildings and forecourt down to the head of White Bay and
including White Bay wharves 1 and 2 (and
maybe 3). The objectives tend towards it
being a job-creation hub, rather than a grand Tate Modern vision.
· White Bay Cruise Passenger Terminal –
Appears to recognise the need to open this facility for much greater local
community access. The Urban Growth
speakers did not rule out a ferry service and we can press for
cafes/restaurants, noting that there are few ships docking there out of season
(none in the past 3 weeks or so).
Noting that
there are immediate plans for a doubling the capacity of the luxury cruiser
facility and dry boat storage in Rozelle Bay, Urban Growth have identified
other Destinations for mid to longer term
development:
·
Rozelle
Bay and Bays Waterways – Appears to be focused on powered vessels, with no
reference to rowers (there for 130 years) or dragon boaters. They plan to integrate a mix of new land and
maritime uses and other living uses (do they mean residential?) with working
harbour (eg Waterways) and on-water recreation facilities (ie jetties, marinas,
etc.) An aside is that it would include
better public waterfront access. UG
acknowledged that there was a substantial and unresolved conflict with the idea
of a continuous foreshore walkway and the development of more super-yacht and
dry boat storage in Rozelle Bay.
· Rozelle Rail Yards – Development of
this area hinges on the future of Westconnex and takes account that some of it
is earmarked for light rail stabling.
Also proposed is mixed housing and better north-south linkages across
the site.
· Glebe Island – Long term project as
it is earmarked as a deep water port for the foreseeable future but proposed to
have public foreshore access at some stage.
The two
biggest impediments to achieving good outcomes for any of these Destinations
are:
Traffic and
Transport
Coordination
of all relevant Government departments and agencies
It is
proposed to double the visitation to the Sydney Fish Markets. This can only be achieved with a drastic
change to the Pyrmont Interchange and Bridge Road/Wattle Street
intersection. In addition, there will
need to be additional public transport.
Ferry services were mentioned at the Summit.
The other
big question is whether Urban Growth will have the authority to over-ride
departmental obstruction in order to meet its principles and objectives for the
Bays Precinct. So far the rhetoric is a
case of hope over experience.
Urban Growth
is also launching a call for Great Ideas.
Of course, we’ve had great ideas spanning 20 years, all of which have
been incorporated in Master Plans over this period. The catch is that the community’s ideas will
be evaluated alongside Grand Ideas from the likes of Meriton, Lend Lease and
Mirvac – and we have been given the same short timeframe to work up our
proposals. Some developers have already
prepared detailed plans (eg the Chinese investor hopeful in the SFM). The Call for Great Ideas opens from 25 May to
6 July. They will be evaluated against objectives
outlined in Transforming City
Living: The Bays Precinct. The Great Ideas will be categorised
according to their contribution to achieving the ambition and objectives. As most of the objectives relate to
job-creation, housing choices, transport and traffic systems and building
design; or to specific sites eg White Bay Power Station, the Sydney Fish
Markets or White Bay CPT, it’s difficult to see how we can meet more than two
objectives (out of a total of 9). The
only Categories that would fit the Bank Street Foreshore Park Project are 3 –
Great Ideas that exceed or meet one or more objective, but not all; and
Category 4 – Good Ideas.
A number of
us are proposing to work up a Good Idea Project for Bank Street Foreshore Park. This was raised by several speakers at the
Leadership Summit and generated considerable interest, also in discussions at
the Sydneysiders Summit on Saturday.
The project would include all sites zoned Public Recreation, including
the proposed park site, the Sydney Heritage Fleet site, 1 Bank St, the small
adjacent RMS site and the Glebe Island Bridge abutment. We are in touch with a Landscape
Architecture student who is working with a team on a class project for the site
and may be able to assist with ideas and graphics. Discussions have taken place with SHF re temporarily
accommodating the dragon boats on its site and more representations will be
made to the Minister for Finance (now in control of 1 Bank Street) to allow the
Pyrmont Heritage Boating Club to be located on the SHFA site. Senior officers of Urban Growth undertook to
take this up with the relevant government officers as a matter of urgency, as
PHBC has been advised that it will receive a notice to quit its current site.
The Bays
Community Coalition has organised the Bays Community Submission Workshop at
2.30-4.30pm on 7 June, 2015 at Leichhardt Town Hall. We urge people to come to this important
meeting to provide input to a community submission on the proposals presented
at the Summits. Submissions are due 30
June, 2015, so there’s very little time.
In fact, the short timeframe contravenes UG’s Principle 4 which
states: “Allow the time to invest in
genuine and early engagement with, and broad acceptance of our plans from all
categories of the public, government and industry”.
Visit the
Urban Growth website for full details: www.thebayssydney.com.au. Also visit http://bayscommunitycoalition.com/ for news and views from the Bays
Community Coalition.
Elizabeth
Elenius
Convenor,
Pyrmont Action Inc.
