[CAN] 123 Flinders Street | 135m | 39lvls | Mixed Use

[Ben]

Plan for city's tallest building
by:
Tim Williams
From:
adelaidenow
November 26, 2012

PLANS are being drawn for what would be Adelaide's tallest building, at the corner of Flinders and Pulteney streets.

Pruszinski Architects is designing a 39-storey tower for developer Datong that would be 135m tall, 3m higher than Adelaide's current tallest building - Westpac House in King William St.

The site was originally slated for a 22-storey, 78m building that was to be the city's tallest residential tower.

After the State Government lifted height restrictions early this year, Datong asked architect Paul Pruszinski to add 10 storeys, taking the tower to 108m.

At that height, it would have been Adelaide's second tallest building.

Mr Pruszinski told the City Messenger he was now designing a 39-storey tower after researching the height limit possible without interfering with flight paths for Adelaide Airport.

He said the site was "well within" the Capital City zone where only aviation considerations restricted building heights.

The tower would house a mix of offices, apartments and either a hotel or serviced apartments.

"We're designing what will be a new tallest (building) in Adelaide," he said.

"We now have an upper limit and we're designing to that limit.

"My brief is to maximise it."

He said his firm was working on a range of ideas, including scaled-up versions of the 22-storey design and completely new concepts.

He did not anticipate any concerns from neighbours.

"There is no residential around us," he said.

"The impact will be on no-one."

The challenge would be to come up with the right design and mix of uses to make the project viable, Mr Pruszinski said.

"It needs to be financially feasible," he said.

"I guess for us the excitement would be if it gets to the construction phase."

No costing had yet been put on the project, he said.

Datong originally wanted a 35-storey tower but it would not have been approved under the old planning regime.

[Splashmo]

I'm actually not the biggest fan of the original proposal. If it's going to be 39 levels I'd love to see something sleek and shiny - no tacky glass. But beggars can't be choosers I guess!

[phenom]

I think a tower that (for all intensive purposes) is the same height as Westpac House would be great for framing and expanding the visual range of the city (ie from one corner to another) from many perspectives. It will certainly add to the new repertoire of photos of Adelaide instead of the standard angles.

The only concerning thing about this is that it reads like they sought clarification on how high they could go re: airport heights and 135m was the answer... even though the proposed site for this is pretty much as far east as you can go and still be in core CBD zoning.

Doesn't exactly inspire one with confidence for the future of anything taller and while it's (obviously) not much of an issue right now, it might well be a decade or so down the track. I suspect anything that really breaks the envelope at some future time will require some serious governmental pressure to 'help' CASA arrive at a more liberal interpretation of what is possible...

[Songsting]

I was going to write something that conveyed my excitement and nervous hope that it does actually get built, despite my fears that all we'll ever end up with are depressing "artist impressions" ... Then I thought that I'd be lazy and simply re-post what I wrote in June...

Boredom smash!
Status quo crash!
Vibrancy splash!
Development cash!
Build it, please.

[crawf]

I think a tower that (for all intensive purposes) is the same height as Westpac House would be great for framing and expanding the visual range of the city (ie from one corner to another) from many perspectives. It will certainly add to the new repertoire of photos of Adelaide instead of the standard angles.

The only concerning thing about this is that it reads like they sought clarification on how high they could go re: airport heights and 135m was the answer... even though the proposed site for this is pretty much as far east as you can go and still be in core CBD zoning.

Doesn't exactly inspire one with confidence for the future of anything taller and while it's (obviously) not much of an issue right now, it might well be a decade or so down the track. I suspect anything that really breaks the envelope at some future time will require some serious governmental pressure to 'help' CASA arrive at a more liberal interpretation of what is possible...

I also found that part a little worrying. Though considering a 200 metre observation tower was once planned for North Terrace, I guess a 140m+ building is still possible.

Not to mention there is already cities across the world that are near a major airport and still have reasonable tall buildings, eg 150m+.

[monotonehell]

Discussion about airport verses building heights split off into its own thread as it's an interesting topic that we've run into many times.
http://www.sensational-adelaide.com/for ... f=4&t=4637

[skyliner]

I'm actually not the biggest fan of the original proposal. If it's going to be 39 levels I'd love to see something sleek and shiny - no tacky glass. But beggars can't be choosers I guess!

I've changed my mind somewhat over the original design but I think it will become iconic due to it's sheer size and accompanying design anyway.(both will be unique and a landmark). Just hope it IS built. Staggering to think the builders are even entertaining such size on the current economic situation.

ADELAIDE - TOWARDS A GREATER CITY SKYLINE

[adam73837]

Has anyone heard any new info on this project? I quite liked the original design and was excited to hear about ambitions to make it the city's tallest tower.

[omada]

Unless it is a residential building, I cannot see a building of this size being built in Adelaide for a long time. Supply of commercial buildings in the CBD has blown out of late.

[Waewick]

Unless it is a residential building, I cannot see a building of this size being built in Adelaide for a long time. Supply of commercial buildings in the CBD has blown out of late.

that isn't entirely true, there is only 1 new building to come onto the market this year, the issue is that the backfill demand is not as strong (and probably weakening) with tenants sticking with lower grade lower rent places longer.

[[Shuz]]

Commercial vacancy rates in the CBD are at an alarming 9.6% or something. Nearly double digits which is not good at all. Dont let the cranes on the skyline fool you, because the truth is that the South Australian economy has been in the shits for a while now and there doesn't seem much hope it will improve in the short term.

[rev]

Commercial vacancy rates in the CBD are at an alarming 9.6% or something. Nearly double digits which is not good at all. Dont let the cranes on the skyline fool you, because the truth is that the South Australian economy has been in the shits for a while now and there doesn't seem much hope it will improve in the short term.

Most of the cranes are for government funded projects..Adelaide Oval, SAHMRI, and New Hospital..

[crawf]

Commercial vacancy rates in the CBD are at an alarming 9.6% or something. Nearly double digits which is not good at all. Dont let the cranes on the skyline fool you, because the truth is that the South Australian economy has been in the shits for a while now and there doesn't seem much hope it will improve in the short term.

Most of the cranes are for government funded projects..Adelaide Oval, SAHMRI, and New Hospital..

And once these projects are complete it will make the city centre more competitive and attractive to invest, live or visit. Same thing goes with the redevelopment of Rundle Mall, Victoria Square, Riverbank etc. Not to mention once the economy improves again, developers wont be faced with loads of red tape and ancient height restrictions unlike in the past.

I think in the long term Adelaide is going to be very well off, the shortterm however is going to be bumpy.

[jk1237]

Commercial vacancy rates in the CBD are at an alarming 9.6% or something. Nearly double digits which is not good at all. Dont let the cranes on the skyline fool you, because the truth is that the South Australian economy has been in the shits for a while now and there doesn't seem much hope it will improve in the short term.

ah well I thought that until 2 weekends ago I inspected an apartment for sale near the Greek on Halifax and there were about 30 people patiently lined up to view and sign up to rental for another apartment. I had no idea that kind of thing is happening in Adelaide but a mate in real estate says that the supply of rental properties since Jan is at a record low and is becoming an issue.

As for office vacancy rates, the latest CC tower on Franklin St has such a huge floorspace that when it came on the market recently the overall supply in Adl would have increased causing vacancy rates to increase for a while.

Our city's economy is not as bad as we think. My work is continuously looking for more workers also. Job losses in manufacturing is still a slight problem though

[Shahkar]

Commercial vacancy rates in the CBD are at an alarming 9.6% or something. Nearly double digits which is not good at all. Dont let the cranes on the skyline fool you, because the truth is that the South Australian economy has been in the shits for a while now and there doesn't seem much hope it will improve in the short term.

Agreed. Have been keeping a look at the numbers of commercial property available and it has been pretty stable at a high rate. But as said, the cranes working on the their projects WILL attract investment. Hopefully, we'll be seeing lots of privately invested projects before 2020. And yeah, almost 4 months now