[CAN] BHP Tower | $250m

[AG]

There was an article in the Business Section of today's paper also stating at that BHP and Santos have taken up space in the refurbished 30 Flinders Street (old SA Police headquarters).

The amount of space both companies have taken up was not mentioned, probably a couple of floors.

The new Santos headquarters were always going to be undersized. They already took up space in the SGIC building next door a few years ago. Considering it is a global headquarters they should be in a much larger/taller building in Adelaide. Their Brisbane offices are taller FFS.

Yes, but Santos doesn't occupy their entire building in Brisbane. (I should know, the company I work for occupies about 7 floors in their building.)

[UrbanSG]

No, they don't occupy the whole building in Brisbane but having naming rights to a taller building and actual signage that is their name instead of a blue cube helps. You would think their headquarters is the skyscraper in Brisbane.

[Brando]

Santos also occupy level 4 & 6 in the Allianz building in Pirie St.

[UrbanSG]

Hopefully Olympic Dam gets signed off by the board at the end of the year despite recent doubts. A 75,000sqm office space demand could be an over the top expectation but I wouldn't be complaining if that was the amount needed.

Adelaide developers bank on mining boom
by: Verity Edwards
From:The Australian
June 23, 2012 12:00AM

SOUTH Australian developers are hoping Adelaide's CBD will soon profit from the projected mining boom and follow in the footsteps of Perth's increasingly tight office market.

With an office space vacancy of about 7.7 per cent, property analysts say Adelaide's market has reached a balance of demand and supply.

"Overall the health of the CBD market is quite strong, but we haven't seen substantial supply come on stream yet," Property Council of SA executive director Nathan Paine said.

"We've got that supply demand balance right for what we should be, but for longer-term growth we'd want to see demand grow."

Several key developments, including a new Australian tax office building on Franklin Street, providing almost 34,000sq m of office space, a second building, of 20,000sq m, on Franklin Street and a new Bendigo and Adelaide Bank building on Grenfell Street, will be completed either later this year or early next year. Early this year, South Australian Police moved into a new 13,500sq m building.

With each of the organisations having moved or preparing to, Mr Paine said there would be openings in the market.

The South Australian commercial property industry is pinning its future growth expectations squarely on the shoulders of BHP Billiton, optimistic that its planned Olympic Dam expansion will create a need for office space for the mining giant and related engineering industries.

A Jones Lang LaSalle white paper on the impact the Olympic Dam expansion would have on Adelaide CBD office space found demand would increase by 35 per cent over the first 12 years of the project.

The white paper, which referred to BHP's environmental impact statement, notes the company alone would need an additional 75,000sq m of office space. That could include BHP bringing its uranium headquarters to Adelaide, but does not include associated engineering company needs.

BHP has until the end of the year to make a commitment to the expansion and chief executive Marius Kloppers has warned that global economic uncertainty could have an impact on plans.

Mr Paine said whether BHP Billiton went ahead with its Olympic Dam expansion plans or not, he hoped growth in the state's mining sector would still create demand in the office market.

"What we've seen so far is some of the engineering companies in particular bringing in staff from interstate," he said. "It's not just Olympic Dam, there's $8 billion worth of mining development going on. They're tooling up for these projects."

He said the Olympic Dam projections could see new buildings being developed, and a further tightening of the vacancy rate from associated companies.

Colliers International chief executive James Young said there was room for growth in Adelaide, particularly with the relaxation of height limits and available development sites.

But he said that, at the moment, there was little need for rapid expansion in the commercial market, because employment growth was steady and there would soon be several vacated sites needing backfilling. "A lot of people have been spooked that this additional office space (from the ATO, the police and the bank moves) will create too much space and there will be blood on the streets," Mr Young said. "But it will be more like a musical chairs situation."

He said with low vacancy rates, prime rents were at an all-time high, plateauing at about $550 per square metre gross.

Mr Young said that figure would average about $500 per square metre for the prime market in the city's core, and $450 in other parts of the CBD. Based on an estimated 3.5 per cent growth, Colliers conservatively anticipates prime rents will grow to about $590 within two years.

While those figures were quite low compared with $800 in Perth, where vacancies sit at about 2 per cent -- or $1000 per square metre in Sydney's core CBD -- he said Adelaide's rents could be compared with other city fringe sites.

"We'd be on par with Melbourne's Docklands, but not Collins Street," he said.

"We might be on par with something like Surry Hills, but not Pitt Street in Sydney."

And while the relaxation of height limits might encourage development, Mr Young said the positive impact would be felt more keenly in the residential apartment market, rather than prime office space. "Residential developers are only limited by their vision, their balance sheet and their clients," he said.

[phenom]

A good article... oh, it's from the Australian and not the Advertiser... not surprised!

One thing they are right about (from my view of the world, anyway) is that most of the growth, if it comes, will be residential apartment towers. Most cities in Australia (I don't know what the world at large is doing) all have built or are building 'new tallest' or near enough which have been largely residential in nature and I would expect no different in Adelaide. Travelling a lot for work I see this, although I have to say having there are some developments I wouldn't want to see in Adelaide regardless of height... the pin-thin Brisbane Soleil tower being one (see picture).



However we are definitely willing and ready to have a couple of nice commercial towers to cement Adelaide's revival and BHP is just the one to be the first. At risk of sounding anti-Perth (I'm absolutely not) I think the BHP building in Perth is an opportunity somewhat wasted (bad location, looks stumpy) so I hope if Adelaide does get something nice (and even 50,000sqm suggests 150m+ unless it's like 400KWS on steroids) we can get something a bit nicer.

[AG]

Many of those tallest residential buildings along the east coast have one responsible entity - Meriton and Harry Triguboff. World Tower, Soleil, and now he's at it again in Brisbane with Infinity on Herschel Street. The apartment trend is well and truly established in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane, but it's only now beginning to take hold in Perth and Adelaide with the backing of Chinese developers.

[thoughtfactory]

Has anybody seen any proposals for a BHP tower in Adelaide? Or is this thread just dreaming and speculation about the tallest building in the CBD?

[wilkiebarkid]

Has anybody seen any proposals for a BHP tower in Adelaide? Or is this thread just dreaming and speculation about the tallest building in the CBD?

"Fantasising"

[Wayno]

Has anybody seen any proposals for a BHP tower in Adelaide? Or is this thread just dreaming and speculation about the tallest building in the CBD?

read the first post of this thread.

[thoughtfactory]

Wayno,
I did read the first post of this thread. All it says is that BHP is planning an office tower in Adelaide linked with its expansion of the Olympic Dam mine and that
BHP Billiton is looking at teaming with a major developer to build that new office tower. I was asking whether anyone knew whether things have moved beyond that--eg., do we know whether they have teamed up with a major developer? If so, do we know what sort of office tower?

[rev]

No, nobody has seen any proposal. There is no proposal. There is no render.
This is speculation based on the information that with the expansion of Olympic Dam, if the BHP board gives it final approval by the end of the year, will translate into BHP requiring more office space in Adelaide. There is also suggestions that it could decide to relocate it's uranium division hq to Adelaide.

Keep an eye on this thread, and this forum. If a proposal is made, and a render becomes available, it will be posted about here.

[Ben]

In the mean time a foyer upgrade?

Type: Development Application Received
Application Number: DA/557/2012
Lodgement Date: 17/08/2012
Location: 49-57 Grenfell Street, ADELAIDE SA 5000
Description: Internal and external alterations to entrance and lobby.

[san-cisco]

Business Writer Meredith Booth
AdelaideNow
August 22, 2012 4:29PM

BHP Billiton has shelved its $30 billion Olympic Dam expansion and will go back to the drawing board to find a cheaper alternative.

The decision throws into grave doubt the promise of more than 10,000 future jobs directly associated with the project, and also creates a worrying black hole in future South Australian state budgets.

There are unconfirmed reports of significant job losses at BHP Billiton's Adelaide headquarters, with redundancies expected to be announced within 24 hours.

The decision to shelve the project also will have significant national economic and political consequences, particularly with the mining tax already being blamed by the Federal Opposition as being a contributing factor.

It raises serious questions about the country's so-called mining boom - and the growing reliance of the federal and state governments on earnings from mineral exploration and exports.

However, BHP chief executive Marius Kloppers today insisted market conditions, subdued commodity prices and higher capital costs led to the decision, which has been the subject of speculation within several months.

"As we finalised the details of the project ... it became clear that the right decision for the company and its shareholders was to continue studies to develop a less capital-intensive option to replace the underground mine at Olympic Dam," Mr Kloppers said.

"Value is always our primary consideration. We believe today's decision reflects an appropriate, prudent and disciplined course of action."

The mine would have become the world's biggest open cut copper and uranium mine at six kilometres long and one kilometre deep.

The news came as BHP Billiton announced a 21 per cent fall in annual profit of $US17.1 billion.

http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/sout ... 6455884519

How unfortunate!

[UrbanSG]

"As we finalised the details of the project ... it became clear that the right decision for the company and its shareholders was to continue studies to develop a less capital-intensive option to replace the underground mine at Olympic Dam," Mr Kloppers said.

Kloppers has wasted so much money at BHP with failed takeover bids, takeovers that have lost money and now this ... hmmm maybe it would have been a good idea to go with a less capital intensive option as a fallback in the first place FFS!

[Ben]

Why can't the state government develop it? They would do that in china. Why not here?