Property Council's Adelaide 2036: Building on Light's Vision

[Aidan]

Struth, what a mess! I regard your report as a collection of half baked schemes, some of which are already discredited! The things we really need, such as an underground railway, are ignored completely.

[Shuz]

Exactly! It's just a regurgitation of ideas already concieved and put down on a few maps to make things look pretty.

We need big-ticket items. The City Stadium seems to be the only one mentioned.

Underground railway, via Gawler Place, station at Victoria Square, and throughfared to the convergence of Noarlunga/Belair lines at Goodwood. Hindley-Rundle Malls?

The underground bus line is a terrible idea. How does this help invigorate street activity?

The tramline proposals are exciting to see and all, but god why down Gray Street, and Frome Street, and Rundle Mall? No! NO! NOO! Simple is better. North Tce > West Tce > Franklin/Flinders > East Terrace.

Airport limitations need not be lobbied for, but rather the relocation of the actual airport itself!

I could vent and rant so much. My ideas are so much better.

[Wayno]

That's harsh. The report contains many suitable proposals that will invigorate Adelaide to succeed well beyond our current trajectory.

I hope this thread becomes filled with well considered (detailed) responses that help build S-A's reputation as an intelligent resource that is representative of the Greater Adelaide community. No one person has all the answers (or all the best ideas). Partnering is the solution...

[Nathan]

Exactly! It's just a regurgitation of ideas already concieved and put down on a few maps to make things look pretty.

We need big-ticket items. The City Stadium seems to be the only one mentioned.

Underground railway, via Gawler Place, station at Victoria Square, and throughfared to the convergence of Noarlunga/Belair lines at Goodwood. Hindley-Rundle Malls?

The underground bus line is a terrible idea. How does this help invigorate street activity?

The tramline proposals are exciting to see and all, but god why down Gray Street, and Frome Street, and Rundle Mall? No! NO! NOO! Simple is better. North Tce > West Tce > Franklin/Flinders > East Terrace.

Airport limitations need not be lobbied for, but rather the relocation of the actual airport itself!

I could vent and rant so much. My ideas are so much better.

I've yet to hear a single valid argument for an underground railway. And the airport absolutely should not be moved.
Big ticket items might add some wow, but a city they do not make. This vision offers a lot of good ideas, that collectively can make quite a difference to the CBD.

[Wayno]

Nathan, so now the plan is out there - what are you doing differently to ensure it gets traction? So many plans simply get published only to be forgotten soon after. Please don't take this the wrong way - i'm an advocate, it's just that we'll get the same result (that is - failure) if we continue requesting change in the same old way.

[edit: and what can we do to help? ]

[agfinglis]

All, Nathan Paine is currently blogging live from AdelaideNow on the Adelaide 2036 proposals. http://www.adelaidenow.com.au

A bit of discussion is also going on via Twitter - hash tag #Adelaide2036.

Cheers

George Inglis

[stumpjumper]

The good points in this report are very good - but the bad points are a serious concern.

It proposes replacing the supposed domination of ACC planning by councillors elected by a residential elite with an unelected five member board.

What about input from the owners of small commercial properties? Where's my say in the development of the city? Why should I be disenfranchised along with the hated residential elites? That sounds like the out-of-date class warfare talk of Nathan's drinking buddy, Kevin Foley.

Nathan Paine says on his blog today that once the special five member board has rezoned the city and everything's set in concrete, the the people will get their city back. From Nathan's blog:

I hope that my project is almost over (well it will be when we get political agreement and action) and then I am happy to turn it over to those that know the public realm the best - the people of South Australia and urban planners. We have been very determined not to specify that activity X should be here and activity Y should be there because that really needs to be left in the hands of the community. We believe that as a community we should agree on what activities we want on our Riverbank, our squares our parklands, in our laneways and public spaces and once we have agreed on that, the masterplan developed, funded and delivered.

As a mechanism for change, Nathan's proposal is a dictatorial outrage. It's naive, half-baked and one dimensional.

As a catalyst for serious discussion, it might work.

[stumpjumper]

On his Advertiser blog today, Nathan Paine said, among other things:

The issue is governance of the CBD. Currently we have a Council that is elected by a handful of people in North Adelaide and the Southeastern Corner of the CBD that govern for the minority not the majority.

When it is the residents that elect the politicians, the politicians will only focus on the residents over the broader interests of South Australia. The only answer is to put control of our city in the hands of an Independent Economic Development Agency that could govern for all not just the vocal minority.

The only answer is to create a new governance structure that allows the interests of all South Australian’s to have a say in how they want their city to look. After consideration of a multitude of governance models from around the world, we are advocating that an Adelaide Economic Development Agency be created, with an Independent State-appointed Board, to oversee the renewal and re-lifing of our great CBD. This is not revolutionary...

How do 'all South Australians' influence the five member board? remember the government, not parliament, appoints this board. Talk about putting the fox in charge of the chickens.

As for having selected this system after looking at the best planning systems around the world, I challenge Nathan Paine to substantiate that claim. It sounds like a recipe for corruption to me, and here in SA, Corruption Central with no ICAC and with the government's Progressive Business SA bribery unit openly selling 'access to government', it's a dead cert.

[gumbi]

There are some good recommendations in the report. I think the Eastern Tramline extension is a great idea and would help to reinvigorate that area of the city. Just thought it might be worth mentioning that the line should be extended right through to the end of North Terrance to connect the Botanic Gardens and the Wine Centre instead of diverting away at Frome.

I don't think Adelaide needs a rapid transport (underground railway/subway) system at this point. It might be something worth looking into in the future but they are extremely expensive, and so many of our wide streets (such as Wakefield Street and King William Rd) would happily accomodate dedicated light rail lanes.

I also agree that something NEEDS to be done about the stupid Kewsick Train Station. What an awful, awful, awful first impression that must be for tourists. Surely the best idea would be to bring interstate rail back into Adelaide station? It's probably large enough and it is a really beautiful building.

[paul]

Exactly! It's just a regurgitation of ideas already concieved and put down on a few maps to make things look pretty.

We need big-ticket items. The City Stadium seems to be the only one mentioned.

Underground railway, via Gawler Place, station at Victoria Square, and throughfared to the convergence of Noarlunga/Belair lines at Goodwood. Hindley-Rundle Malls?

The underground bus line is a terrible idea. How does this help invigorate street activity?

The tramline proposals are exciting to see and all, but god why down Gray Street, and Frome Street, and Rundle Mall? No! NO! NOO! Simple is better. North Tce > West Tce > Franklin/Flinders > East Terrace.

Airport limitations need not be lobbied for, but rather the relocation of the actual airport itself!

I could vent and rant so much. My ideas are so much better.

I've yet to hear a single valid argument for an underground railway. And the airport absolutely should not be moved.
Big ticket items might add some wow, but a city they do not make. This vision offers a lot of good ideas, that collectively can make quite a difference to the CBD.

And some "wow" is exactly what Adelaide lacks. This vision does nothing to directly address that.

[fabricator]

My questions are about the tram extensions.

Why is it the extensions are designed around existing bus services and current land usage ?
That is no inner city services south of Victoria Square, routes chosen on the basis of traffic levels rather than where passengers most want to get to.
You show two areas of retail focus, but there is no tram or free bus service to feed them.
The City East loop

The keswick rail terminal has a stub tram line from Sir Donald Bradman drive, instead of running a tram down Anzac Highway/Richmond road. Could take a short cut over the tracks to reduce walking distances.

[stumpjumper]

I like your Advertiser poll, fabricator. It's just like one of theirs.

My $150,000 worth:

I'd renovate the Old Adelaide Gaol and the Police Barracks (the cops want to move) to create a new national rail station, Adelaide metropolitan station and the bus terminal. 5-minute shuttles would run from the Gaol transport interconnector through a cut and shut tunnel under the North Tce north footpath to a new O-Bahn terminal at Hackney in the rose garden area, the O-Bahn having continued over the Torrens and under Park Terrace to run along the east side of the Botanic Park.

There would be a tram loop right around the city (maybe taking the place of the underground rail shuttle along North Tce) and crossing the city north south along King William St and east west along Wakefield and Grote Streets, revitalising them. The tram tracks would cross in Vic Square, cleverly. Plenty of stations, and park and ride where possible.

[AG]

I'd renovate the Old Adelaide Gaol and the Police Barracks (the cops want to move) to create a new national rail station, Adelaide metropolitan station and the bus terminal. 5-minute shuttles would run from the Gaol transport interconnector through a cut and shut tunnel under the North Tce north footpath to a new O-Bahn terminal at Hackney in the rose garden area, the O-Bahn having continued over the Torrens and under Park Terrace to run along the east side of the Botanic Park.

How does this contribute to improving connectivity across the transport network? The last thing we need to be doing is taking the central train station further away from the major activity area when it is currently sitting on the edge of it. Another thing we don't want to be doing is forcing commuters to change services simply because their service doesn't quite get them close enough to their destination to walk, this makes public transport a less attractive option and will discourage people from using it when we should be encouraging the opposite. Put this in perspective, there are 40000+ people a day who pass through Adelaide Station, compared with less than 1000 a day on average who use the Keswick Interstate Terminal. Is it really worth building a new train station between the two simply to shorten the travel distance marginally for those few hundred people at the expense of the thousands who use Adelaide Station?

I don't know how much knowledge you have about engineering considerations, but cut and cover is not a practical option for a busy thoroughfare like North Terrace considering the disruptive nature of the construction techniques required to achieve this.

True that Keswick isn't the best place for long distance trains to be greeting incoming visitors, and I do agree that the location where long distance trains arrive and depart from Adelaide needs to be in a more central location. This shouldn't be at the expense of other travelers though.

[BenJ]

Congrats Nathan on the report. That is a really positive step in the right direction. I like the concentration on building the foundation for change rather than specifying exactly what that change should be.

Absolutely, we need to get the managing bodies sorted out, whether it be council or government, so that decisions can be made in a streamlined and efficient manner. I see nothing dictatorial in what is proposed but rather a recognition that the current systems and bureaucracy in place just simply is not working.

In relation to the discussion on this forum, I would really suggest that we focus on achieving the right processes and developmental culture in the state, rather than debating specific end results such as underground railways and city stadiums, which will not be achieved if the former is left lacking.

I think the emphasis should be on exerting pressure on government to take up some of these proposals to change the governance structure of the city, to implement an urban design charter, appoint a state architect etc etc, thereby creating a roughly bi-partisan vision for what we want our city to become.

Get that right and the rest will follow.

[Aidan]

There are some good recommendations in the report. I think the Eastern Tramline extension is a great idea and would help to reinvigorate that area of the city. Just thought it might be worth mentioning that the line should be extended right through to the end of North Terrance to connect the Botanic Gardens and the Wine Centre instead of diverting away at Frome.

The Botanic Gardens aren't exactly difficult to get to, and extending it there wouldn't attract many more people. As for the Wine Centre, who wants to go there? This white elephant should never have been built in the City to start with.

I don't think Adelaide needs a rapid transport (underground railway/subway) system at this point. It might be something worth looking into in the future but they are extremely expensive,

No they aren't. Although it would cost over a billion dollars, it will still be much cheaper than the South Road upgrading.

and so many of our wide streets (such as Wakefield Street and King William Rd) would happily accomodate dedicated light rail lanes.

Yes, our City is well suited to light rail (see the link in my .sig) but building light rail won't give a huge boost to passenger numbers on our main suburban railway lines.

I also agree that something NEEDS to be done about the stupid Kewsick Train Station. What an awful, awful, awful first impression that must be for tourists. Surely the best idea would be to bring interstate rail back into Adelaide station? It's probably large enough and it is a really beautiful building.

Not only is it not large enough, its inadequate ventilation makes it a bigger disgrace than Keswick Terminal!

Properly linking the suburban and interstate platforms at Keswick, and having a frequent train service stopping there, would solve most of the problems there.