Vitalnorthadelaide

The Save the Cranker team has come up with a brilliant template to make it easy to make a submission to the State Planning Commission's SCAP regarding Wee Hur's proposed development at the Crown and Anchor site in our East End.

The template is here:
https://savethecranker.com.au/letters
It is due by Friday next the 10th May at midnight
Note that you or your rep can choose to speak at SCAP for up to 5 minutes.

The potential for a huge utilitarian building in our prime visitor precinct, the East End, is a ridiculous outcome enabled by our very clumsy planning regulations, which have the potential to wreck our visitor areas in this way until we can persuade government to rescind them.

Densifying a city need not destroy the vitality of visitor areas as they provide all the life and colour in a city. They also keep younger adults in town.

This is a heritage matter of considerable substance as the Cranker is deeply embedded in East End history. From the late 1800s it was a watering place for workers, and vegetable and fruit producers from the East End Market- from mid morning onward. It is a final remnant of the bustling East End of old, extraordinary in that it is still alive and being used for its original use but a substantial music performance space as well.

We are in a very important struggle to keep Adelaide authentic, attractive, amenable- and visitor friendly. Please help out as best you can by supporting Save the Cranker

Excellent rally today, a lot of fun, plenty of music-on-wheels, exuberant. Thousands of participants. This has the potential to shift the goalposts in a substantial way on protecting our main streets and heritage and especially protecting music and arts venues. Everyone clearly feels they do not want to live in a beige vanilla city, but a lively, grainy human-scale one.
If you want to help please get busy writing to Upper House MP's before the motion is put on Wednesday details are here
https://savethecranker.com.au/

On the PlanSA Property and Planning Atlas website, both the Exeter and Austral hotel sites have the same height limit as the Cranker at 53m or 15 storeys. The Grace Emily site is only slightly lower at 43m. This means that under current planning regulations, all of these hotels could be replaced by towers tomorrow! There is nothing protecting them or the vibrant, human-scale streets around them that we love. It is absurd that the most functional and successful part of the city can be destroyed piece by piece, as is happening with the Cranker. Towers are suitable for dormitories and offices, but not for fun. They should be in dormitory or office zones and are completely incompatible with fun visitor zones. The government's own planning code is waging war on our most popular public spaces and threatens to kill off our city bit by bit.

Clumsy State Planning rules put ALL our friendly human-scale hospitality precincts such as the East End under threat. Apart from taking out the Cranker, Roxy's etc, unbelievably this monster chops a big corner block off the East End! Send a message to government by coming to the rally!

Letter to The Advertiser 11/04/2024

Vibrant heart - The Advertiser 11/04/2024

Melbourne has Federation Square which is vibrant civic space day and night. Sydney City Council is buying up land opposite their town hall to create their own large civic space.

Meanwhile in Adelaide we seem to be in an alternative universe.

On the formerly run-down Festival Plaza we are getting a second huge tower on public land that should have been our own civic space.

Profound lack of ambition and cringe-worthy urban planning policies by government here and at the Crown and Anchor site are threatening to slowly turn once- visionary Adelaide into a cemetery.

Robert Farnan, North Adelaide

Vital North Adelaide Inc are running an online raffle to attempt to raise the remaining $38,700 for a former resident who faced a $55,000 developer’s cost order as a result of bravely contesting the planning approval for the former Le Cornu site ($16,300 has been raised from donations).
The former resident was the owner of a single-storey cottage who was expecting City Council’s promised up-to 8-storey development but instead was to end up with three 14-16 level towers built just across her quite small street.
We hope you will support us wholeheartedly in this David and Goliath affair by buying a lot of tickets!
Please hurry though as this very special raffle of high quality glassware and ceramics at rafflelink.com.au/northad is drawn on 28th August 2023.

Vitalnorthadelaide Vital North Adelaide Inc is residents, businesses and a network of planners, architects, and creative

This what civic imagination should look like in 2022! It uses the power of visitor attraction and not the simplistic options of increasing resident density and trying to fiddle the retail mix as the answer to re-generating a main-street !
Adelaide once applied this sort of thinking to its East End, Halifax depot, Leigh and Peel Streets and to the Central Market precinct to great success. Goodwood and Prospect main streets are other excellent examples.
Densification, wrongly zoned, threatens the natural attractiveness of Adelaide's human-scale visitor streets and, more seriously, the natural attractiveness of Adelaide itself as a destination.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/sydney-s-streets-face-revamp-with-outdoor-dining-more-public-spaces-20221228-p5c936.html?utm_content=TOP_STORIES&list_name=E2446F7A-1897-44FC-8EB8-B365900170E3&promote_channel=edmail&utm_campaign=am-smh-weekend&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&utm_term=2022-12-29&mbnr=MzEwOTM5OTU&instance=2022-12-29-07-05-AEDT&jobid=29470669

Sydney’s streets face revamp with outdoor dining, more public spaces NSW Planning Minister Rob Stokes wants to turn the state’s Central Business Districts into Central Social Districts with more al fresco dining to boost street activity and help local businesses.

Our under pressure green belt:

https://www.foreground.com.au/parks-places/garden-cities-no-australias-leafy-urban-centres-pressure/

Garden Cities no-more: Australia’s leafy urban centres are under pressure A report has found Australia's cities are failing to live up to their much-celebrated reputation for 'liveability'.

It is good to see that governments allowing
developments through with minimal community input is starting to be challenged!
My recent door-knocking in North Adelaide on hundreds of doors has elicited, so far, three occasions where I found a strong supporter of the City Council's current proposal. There have been a small number, probably 20 to 30, who feel that 'something has to happen' , and a lot of very angry people who cannot see why such a attractive inner suburb should be sacrificed to over development when for a similar cost a growth-generating was achievable.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/don-t-call-them-nimbys-teal-politics-all-about-overdevelopment-20221006-p5bnnb.html?utm_content=pm_dismisses_changes_to_tax_cuts&list_name=E2446F7A-1897-44FC-8EB8-B365900170E3&promote_channel=edmail&utm_campaign=am-smh&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&utm_term=2022-10-10&mbnr=MzEwOTM5OTU&instance=2022-10-10-06-47-AEDT&jobid=29420392

Don’t call them NIMBYs: ‘Teal’ politics all about overdevelopment From the north shore to Vaucluse, independent candidates for state seats want to push back on density that’s too high and buildings that are too tall.

https://indaily.com.au/news/local/2022/08/09/le-cornu-site-contract-reveals-councils-reliance-on-apartment-sales/

Le Cornu site contract reveals council's reliance on apartment sales - InDaily The Adelaide City Council has released the land contract for the $250m development at 88 O’Connell St after initially keeping it under wraps, with the document revealing apartment sales for the project are critical to the council recouping the money it spent to buy the long-vacant old Le Cornu sit...

https://indaily.com.au/news/local/2022/08/08/rex-patrick-confirms-lord-mayor-tilt-calls-for-new-20-year-city-plan/?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=InDaily%20AM%20Express%20%208%20August%202022&utm_content=InDaily%20AM%20Express%20%208%20August%202022+CID_b1fec7799a850f64e54b5edc5a36e288&utm_source=EDM

Excellent news for Adelaide. The Transparency Warrior himself, Rex Patrick, has committed to running for Mayor, campaigning on "improving the council’s transparency, governance and planning for the city."
He has our total support. Go Rex!

Rex Patrick confirms Lord Mayor tilt, calls for new 20-year city plan - InDaily EXCLUSIVE | Rex Patrick will run for Adelaide Lord Mayor this year, with the former senator unveiling a campaign platform of council transparency, better governance and a new long-term plan for the city.

https://thefifthestate.com.au/columns/spinifex/naffelaide-time-for-adelaide-to-just-grow-up/
Mike Brown's call for the sort of imagination that Adelaide was founded on.

Naffelaide: “…time for Adelaide to just grow up” In Myeh-delaide (Part 1), we reviewed examples of simmering national disdain of Adelaide. These negative perspectives seem to centre on visitor experiences of the city, yet are contradicted by deep local affection for the place – and by much of Adelaide that is actually very good.

https://indaily.com.au/news/local/2022/07/18/rex-patrick-takes-aim-at-old-le-cornu-site-secrecy/

Rex Patrick takes aim at old Le Cornu site secrecy - InDaily Potential Lord Mayoral candidate Rex Patrick has criticised an Adelaide City Council decision to keep the contract for the $250m O’Connell Street development confidential, claiming it creates an impression the council “can only function properly in an environment of secrecy”.

It's in everyone's interest that balustrades are made opaque, or at least translucent!
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/underwear-flapping-in-the-breeze-putting-sydney-s-balconies-to-the-n**e-test-20220712-p5b11i.html?utm_content=top_stories&list_name=E2446F7A-1897-44FC-8EB8-B365900170E3&promote_channel=edmail&utm_campaign=am-smh-weekend&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&utm_term=2022-07-16&mbnr=MzEwOTM5OTU&instance=2022-07-16-05-20-AEST&jobid=29401399

‘Underwear flapping in the breeze’: Putting Sydney’s balconies to the n**e test Apartments account for about half of all dwellings built in NSW. That makes a good balcony, providing access to fresh air and somewhere to eat or hang out the washing, more important.

At this stage, it's not a very inspiring looking building, but Twiggy Forrest can't go wrong by consulting with residents and leveraging the local area's character.
https://www.realcommercial.com.au/news/proposed-fremantle-hotel-should-respect-history-sustainability

Proposed Fremantle hotel should respect history, sustainability A proposed boutique hotel in the heart of Fremantle is more likely to win over locals and attract tourists if it respects the district’s history and can prove its sustainability credentials, an analyst says.

Smart, green and attractive development.
https://thefifthestate.com.au/columns/spinifex/canberras-answer-to-a-lively-greek-village/

Canberra's answer to a lively Greek village When Johnathan Efkarpidis, the director of Molonglo Group and one of the masterminds behind the world-acclaimed NewActon precinct, told me of his vision for Dairy Road, I was startled.

Le Cornu Forestville Concept: Renewal SA image

A fabulous concept that's just been released for the OTHER Le Cornu site at Forestville. Open-spaced, a variety of buildings, contemporary, medium-height, smart. Who could stay away!
https://indaily.com.au/news/2022/06/17/old-le-cornu-site-250m-masterplan-revealed/
All images courtesy of Renewal SA

Wonderful Peel and Leigh Sts again. It's hard to stay away from these open spaces. It's very hard to understand how Adelaide City Council can want to put in a huge building in O'Connell St that has none of these open but sheltered spaces that bring people back again and again and again. There's no vibrancy-deadening medical centre here of course. Maybe they should take out all those floors of offices and shops in the current proposal that will probably never fill and create a huge undercover area and food court that will have a hope of creating 'vibrancy'. Despite all the bad feeling (to.put it mildly) directed against residents and businesses opposed to this humongous build there's not been a single solitary word about how such a huge building will enliven the street when their reputation is that they suck the life out of a street, unless in a sweaty dense city such as Hong Kong. The word 'nimby' is enough to turn the brain to mush apparently and trumps any notion of democratic rights and free expression. Resident input has the advantage of improving the outcome all round too. We'll continue to fight for a precinct in North Adelaide that looks like this and against anything big, bland and corporate.

A very welcoming and European-style medium -rise streetscape in the street behind Plant 4 in Bowden. Smart, modern and sustainable. A 21st century solution!

Brilliant example of Urban Regeneration weaving it's magic! Henley Square. Each time we go there's a new cafe, restaurant or shop. An attractive precinct with open spaces generates visitor foot traffic that enables a steadily growing number of shops that would not be there otherwise. 62-100 O'Connell offers just as much opportunity as a thriving visitor magnet!

A great 6 storey recent development in North Adelaide on the old Channel 9 site. It blends in perfectly with the surrounding buildings and adds amenity to the area. Residents were consulted. How 62-100 O'Connell should be developed!

The State Planning Commission lacks balance! Please send a letter to the Planning Minister Vickie Chapman.
You might say something like the following:
Phone: 08 8332 4799, Post: 357 Greenhill Rd, Toorak Gardens, SA, 5065
Email: [email protected]

Minister, there is considerable community concern about how planning is being handled in South Australia. I request that you consider the following -

STATE PLANNING COMMISSION - IMMEDIATELY ADD TWO MORE PEOPLE Currently there are 4 people on the State Planning Commission. This does NOT provide balanced representation for our state planning authority. The Planning, Development and Infrastructure Act Specifically, S 19 of the Act allows the Minister to nominate up to two additional members to the Commission. S19(2) outlines the process that is required to do this. It is recommended that these two appointments to the Commission be made immediately. Currently missing expertise is (e) social or environmental policy or science; and (f) local government, public administration or law.

STATE COMMISSION ASSESSMENT PANEL (SCAP) -
There is an urgent need to review the meeting procedures of the State Commission Assessment Panel (SCAP) -
hearings should enable open and transparent decision making - given the loss of confidence in decision making, and exclusion of the public in the current meetings undertaken in camera.
Grounds for appeal should be available for third party representers where policies are contentious – where developments could be argued as ‘seriously at variance’ but approved; dismissing third party representations