REVEALED: Latest plans for new city high school
The State Government is planning a second multi-storey building next to the Reid Building on Frome Road to accommodate its 1000-student new city high school, InDaily can reveal.
A confidential Education Department briefing, detailing the State Government’s plans for the new school, was given at Town Hall last night.
Sources who attended the closed-doors meeting have told InDaily the Government intends to construct a second building to the south of the Reid Building, within the project’s $85 million construction budget.
The building would be one storey taller than the existing six-storey building, with an atrium in the centre joining the two.
The Reid Building itself would be stripped back to its main structures with a significant rebuild of the outer structures in the works, the meeting was told.
Preliminary designs and drawings of the buildings, presented by department officials to the meeting, were described as looking like two “uneven boxes” with an atrium at the centre and an “expressive façade”, and one of the buildings will feature bicycle parking in its basement.
The designs would more than double the built floorspace of the new city school.
The Government would not release the drawings or designs it presented to the meeting.
The plans involves zero on-site car parking and no extra on-street parking on Frome Road, which only features two driving lanes.
Transportation of students to and from the school would, instead, rely heavily on public transport and cycling.
RAA senior manager for road safety Charles Mountain told InDaily it was reasonable to a school so close to the CBD to rely mostly on public transport, walking and cycling for student transport, but some provision would still need to be made for pick-up and drop-off using cars.
“There would still need to be some provision for whom those [non-car] options are not appropriate,” including people with impaired mobility, he said.
“[But] hopefully most of the students would walk, cycle or use public transport.”
Mountain said there was currently limited off-peak parking on Frome Road.
The Government said the plans it presented to the council last night were “conceptual” and would neither confirm or deny any details.
“We appreciate there is strong interest in our new city school,” the Department for Education and Child Development’s executive director for infrastructure Ross Treadwell said in a statement to InDaily.
“We are still in the design phase of the project and look forward to revealing our new city school’s plans soon.”
The construction plans also include a ground-level gymnasium, attached to the eastern side of one of the buildings.
However, InDaily has been told this would be the only sporting facility on the site.
The Government is continuing negotiations with the University of Adelaide about the shared use of its sports fields, last night’s meeting was told.
A university spokesperson said early last year that while sports grounds are sometimes made available to other groups, “availability is limited”.
