[PRO] 134-136 Wright Street | 58m | 16 Levels | Motel

[Ben]

First app of the year.

DEMOLISH A PORTION OF THE LOCAL HERITAGE PLACE (TOWNSCAPE) AT 134 WRIGHT STREET, ADELAIDE AND A PORTION OF THE SINGLE STOREY BUILDING AT 136 WRIGHT STREET, ADELAIDE, AND CONSTRUCT A 16 STOREY MOTEL CONTAINING 100 ROOMS AND A ROOFTOP TERRACE

[PeFe]

A motel?......a new motel in the CBD?

Motels were really really cheap 1 story hotels we built in the suburbs in the 1960's 70's and 80's.

Let's hope this is NOT a really cheap and nasty hotel for the CBD.

[Norman]

I don't have a problem with a motel if it is architecturally sympathetic to the area. We can't expect all the tourists to stay at high-end hotels and shoebox budget hotels.

I associate motels with family holidays for the lower and middle class, and this market segment should be catered for as well.

[bva]

I would not worry. It is called a motel due to legal planning advice. I recall similar for the hotel being developed in playford. Cant recall exact reason why but not likely to be a motel like people associate.

[SBD]

I would not worry. It is called a motel due to legal planning advice. I recall similar for the hotel being developed in playford. Cant recall exact reason why but not likely to be a motel like people associate.

Customers are highly unlikely to park right by their rooms in a 16 storey building.

I guess a motel looks like it expects driving tourists - say part way through a driving holiday through western Victoria and South Australia - but a hotel expects customers to fly in?

[bva]

I am a planner and deal with this. A motel has nothing to do with car spaces. It is a building for more than 5 travellers with no liquor licence. As I said it is a recent legal advice on description of development.

[rhino]

The idea of a motel was originally a motoring hotel - a hotel for motorists travelling between endpoints of their journey. As such they were typically 1- or 2-storey buildings with outdoor parking, and catered typically for short stays. The definition has obviously changed over time.

[citywatcher]

The idea of a motel was originally a motoring hotel - a hotel for motorists travelling between endpoints of their journey. As such they were typically 1- or 2-storey buildings with outdoor parking, and catered typically for short stays. The definition has obviously changed over time.

The US is flooded with them if you ever do a driving trip there . Cheap, comfortable .

Sent from my SM-J730G using Tapatalk

[gnrc_louis]

Heritage cottages under threat from new hotel but no public consultation
Local

Three 1880 heritage-listed row cottages on Wright Street could be partially demolished to make way for a 16-storey hotel – but State Government planning rules mean the public won’t be consulted or be able to view the plans before development approval is granted.

Stephanie Richards
@stephrrichards
Print article
The 1880 bluestone row cottages on Wright Street are up for partial demolition to make way for a 16-storey hotel. Photo: Tony Lewis/InDaily

Adelaide developer Future Urban Group lodged a development application earlier this month asking for approval to partially bulldoze two bluestone cottages on Wright Street in the city to build a $10.9 million “16-storey tourist accommodation with rooftop terrace”.

The row cottages at 134 and 136 Wright Street were constructed in 1880 and are listed on the Adelaide City Council’s local heritage register.

Planning changes implemented by former Planning Minister John Rau in the last term of government mean the proposal is automatically granted category one development status, meaning the public won’t be able to view or be consulted on the plans before a decision is made.
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The same controversial planning reforms also raised the accepted building height limit in the city’s predominately residential southwestern corner to 20 storeys.

A real estate advertisement published in 2016 when the cottages were last sold states that the zone in which the buildings are located “is highly flexible” for development.

“This quality property allows a buyer to lease out the existing units, redevelop the entire site or value add to the current buildings, subject to council consent,” the advertisement states.

“The capital city zone is highly flexible with one objective stating ‘a vibrant mix of commercial, retail, professional services, hospitality, entertainment, educational facilities and medium and high-density living’, making the site highly versatile now and for future development.”

A spokesperson from the State Commission Assessment Panel confirmed to InDaily yesterday that Future Urban Group had lodged an application for the site.

It basically will mean the end of the southwest corner’s cottage, low-scale type of historic relevance

The spokesperson said the panel had not made the plans public as it was a category one development, meaning public notification was not required.

Developments in the Capital City Zone – which covers Wright Street – are automatically given category one status unless they are located on land adjacent to the City Living Zone or Adelaide Historic (Conservation) Zone.

InDaily contacted Future Urban Group for comment, but a spokesperson said the relevant planner in charge of the proposed Wright Street high-rise hotel was unavailable.

According to the state’s land register, two separate companies with the same Wayville address own 134 and 136 Wright Street.

Adelaide City councillor Anne Moran, who sits on the council’s assessment panel, said the proposed Wright Street development was “one of the first developments that really shows the flaw in the planning changes under the Rau regime”.

“This is what we feared would happen, that the very low-scale cottage-type area of the southwest would become just enormously damaged by the allowance of such height limits,” she said.

“We said if you just make it category one, up to 20 storeys – which a lot of these residential streets can now become – you make the land so valuable in one way because if you knock down the cottage you can sell the land to a developer for a 20-storey building.
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“The land value goes up, the value of getting rid of your heritage house is enormously expanded and if you don’t you could have a 20-storey building right next to it anyway.

“It basically will mean the end of the southwest corner’s cottage, low-scale type of historic relevance.”

Moran said it was possible that developers would leave the front of the Wright Street cottages intact and demolish the back-end of the buildings as local heritage listings only applied to what could be seen from the street.

“I suspect they’re doing a tokenistic retaining of the front bit and down the side and whacking a great thing behind it,” she said.

“It sounds like they’re skirting the local heritage issue by doing that and the 16-storeys wouldn’t trigger anything because the height limits have been dramatically increased all over the city.”

Deputy Lord Mayor Alexander Hyde, whose ward covers Wright Street, said he “understood” Future Urban Group’s proposed hotel design was “attractive”, but he questioned the suitability of the location.

“It’s going to have a serious impact on the streetscape, there will be issues with shadowing at various times of the day, it will be obviously out of character with other neighbouring heritage places,” he said.

“As a city and a government we need to be encouraging taller buildings to be located in the central part of the city and not in the residential south.”

Hyde said it was a “complete failure of the system” that the public would not be consulted on the development proposal, adding that while the council would provide comment about the need to preserve the cottages’ front façades, its “hands were tied” as it does not have decision-making powers for developments over $10 million.

“What we really don’t want to see is like what happened with the Opus apartments on Hutt Street, when those two bluestone buildings were demolished for an apartment that never appeared,” he said.

“We could see a situation where there is a partial demolition of these cottages before the building is ready to begin.

“If that’s the case, it’s going to be very difficult to get those buildings usable again and it may be that a subsequent application could see the buildings totally demolished.”

InDaily asked the Department for Planning, Planning and Infrastructure when a decision on Future Urban Group’s application would likely be made and whether the public could appeal it, but is yet to receive a response.

[SRW]

If this were the other side of Whitmore Square I'd understand the concern for scale, but this is in the immediate vicinity of the market precinct and only a block down from Bohem. Although we don't know yet what exactly is proposed, it sounds as though the developer is at least being sensitive to the area by retaining a portion of the local heritage place. Even if only exercise in façadism, that's more thoughtful than just demolishing the place (as local heritage is worth essentially naught).

[PeFe]

These cottages are worth saving or "incorporating" into the "motel" development.

[Neko Neko Peko Peko]

I think it would be a shame to lose these cottages and they should at least be savoured as a feature for the new hotel....

BUT

That article makes me want to slam my head on my desk. People worried about what raising the height limit to twenty stories would do to this part of the city. It is the main CBD of Adelaide, not a country town! - Cities are the Urban centers, and should be packed with opportunity to provide a skyline. That part of the city is barely activated apart from Whitmore Square and some more high rises will probably do it good. I can see that part of the city becoming a bespoke laneway type of place, especially with the prominance of Troppo there.... If this hotel managed to retain these cottages as a bespoke eatery or gallery type thing, while having Oz spec style aesthetic on top the other buildings in this zone have used, it would be quite amazing.

[Patrick_27]

That article makes me want to slam my head on my desk. People worried about what raising the height limit to twenty stories would do to this part of the city. It is the main CBD of Adelaide, not a country town! - Cities are the Urban centers, and should be packed with opportunity to provide a skyline. That part of the city is barely activated apart from Whitmore Square and some more high rises will probably do it good. I can see that part of the city becoming a bespoke laneway type of place, especially with the prominance of Troppo there.... If this hotel managed to retain these cottages as a bespoke eatery or gallery type thing, while having Oz spec style aesthetic on top the other buildings in this zone have used, it would be quite amazing.

I completely disagree with your comments here. Firstly, the bulk of Adelaide's skyline (office and apartment buildings) are to the north of Victoria Square and even without any planning limitations of late we're still only gradually seeing that part of the city reach new heights and become more dense, we should be focusing on building that area up before we even consider south of Victoria Square. I don't see any merit in bulldozing heritage-listed or 100 y.o. cottages in CBD south in favour of cheap $10m apartment buildings, service apartment buildings and motels; particularly when there are empty office buildings on the other side of the city that could be repurposed for residential or demolished and replaced with residential buildings. Similarly to urban sprawl, you don't go building on farm land and forests until you've exhausted/maximised the existing open space within a suburb. You talk about this part of the city having minimal activity but from reading that it sounds like you've never actually been on that side of the city at all? The quietest pockets of this area are where land has been cleared for failed apartment developments; what does that tell you?

[Algernon]

The cottages are worth saving IMO. I can't really see these being incorporated into a 16 storey development without it looking ridiculous. If they just park a fat highrise behind the older building ala the Tivoli Hotel development then I'd fuck this DA off in a heart beat.

Just a note on heritage - there is the heritage that is tied up in the building itself, but just as importantly is the context in its surroundings. The thing that detracts most from this structure's heritage value is not the building itself, but the 3 level box immediately next door. You could argue a case for this being a heritage building but have less luck arguing the street as being a heritage place. Ultimately that's what I think would tip the scale in favour of the developers here.

[Neko Neko Peko Peko]

I completely disagree with your comments here. Firstly, the bulk of Adelaide's skyline (office and apartment buildings) are to the north of Victoria Square and even without any planning limitations of late we're still only gradually seeing that part of the city reach new heights and become more dense, we should be focusing on building that area up before we even consider south of Victoria Square. I don't see any merit in bulldozing heritage-listed or 100 y.o. cottages in CBD south in favour of cheap $10m apartment buildings, service apartment buildings and motels; particularly when there are empty office buildings on the other side of the city that could be repurposed for residential or demolished and replaced with residential buildings. Similarly to urban sprawl, you don't go building on farm land and forests until you've exhausted/maximised the existing open space within a suburb. You talk about this part of the city having minimal activity but from reading that it sounds like you've never actually been on that side of the city at all? The quietest pockets of this area are where land has been cleared for failed apartment developments; what does that tell you?

I think there has been some miscommunication on what I was trying to say. I walked through this part of town the other day, as I work in this side of the city. What I noticed is this area is largely made up of single and two story businesses and private residencies. There was no one else around in this area - and other than Whitmore Square and the few hospitality providers around it, I do not know of a reason to visit this part of the city. I'd love to hear of them, because I'd go to them

I am not saying this entire portion of this city should be immediately filled with 20 story buildings, my point was for my frustration against so many people being against taller buildings being built in the CBD and claiming 20 stories to be too tall. Like you said, you don't go utilising new land unless you have filled up what you have - this is part of Adelaide's CBD square mile, and ideally you would densify this area by having taller buildings here, rather than move into Unley and Goodwood like they are doing. I am not saying heritage should be removed to do this, but there are plenty of delipated or empty properties in this area,there seems to be a residential market here so why not densify it?

Personally, I'd love to see these cottages stay and be untouched. They are a well maintained example of building from this era, and if they were to demolish them to place some shitty fibre cement clad building there, I would be very cross. What I was suggesting in my post, was how these heritage buildings could be utilised with in a new building - which is wishful thinking, but what I would do if I was the developer going ahead with this project.