Our suburbs

[sbagman]

What do you think of the suburbs most of us live in? What do you think of inner city development in cities such as Melbourne and Brisbane?

I'll leave my own opinion until later on....

 

[knuckles]

I'm glad to see they are reigning in the urban sprawl in Melb. Inner city development is good IMO. Should have started in the 70s. Rather than making AV Jennings a wealthy man with "Toorak of the North!!" developments and draining the govt coffers to provide the infrastructure to support these developments. The SE sprawl is a blight on Vic IMO. Spend some time in LA, and you can see it at its worse.

 

[Pessimistic]

I hate blocks subdivided into 4a,b and possibly c. Better to take a larger area and build compact housing all over it. Even then some developers are far too greedy. Port melbourne for example.

Some of the tilt slab hi-rise are shockers

 

[Captain Sensible]

Originally posted by Pessimistic
some developers are far too greedy. Port melbourne for example.

Oh yeah. The entire amenity of the area has been destroyed.

 

[knuckles]

This sort of development I don't mind, as long as the chagracter of the original building is maintained ('cept for those 60s nightmares):

Apartments for Bunnings site
By Royce Millar
October 24 2002


Eighteen months ago it was jostling to become one of Melbourne's first office towers in a decade. Now the former McEwans building in Bourke Street is heading for a new life as an apartment and retail complex.

The new owner, Melbourne developer Stephen Donnelly, has sought State Government approval to transform the building, now used as a Bunnings store, for residential and strip retail. In May, Mr Donnelly bought the property for $21 million from Hong Kong-based PL Nominees in an off-market sale involving Teska & Carson.

PL paid $9.6 million for the site after it was passed in at a mortgagee auction in 1993.

If approved, the complex will include bookend apartment towers of 11 and 20 levels, at Bourke and Little Collins Street. The 235 apartments will be priced from about $350,000.

The shell of the existing building will stay but the interior will be gutted and refurbished for retail and carparking.


Mr Donnelly said the ground-level retail would include fashion outlets and cafes. Three small shopfronts would replace the existing Bunnings presence on Bourke Street.

He said the redevelopment was ideally timed to take advantage of a major upgrade of the area around Bourke and Elizabeth Streets.

Mr Donnelly said his redevelopment proposal would allow the apartment towers to be deferred if the residential market was not ready to absorb another 200 city apartments.

Bunnings pays $2 million gross rent a year on a lease that runs to 2006.

Mr Donnelly said he would proceed with the development soon if Bunnings agreed to find alternative premises. But he said he was happy to wait until 2006 if necessary.


This story was found at: http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2002/10/23/1034561552672.html

 

[Pessimistic]

Thats OK but I work at the top end of lonsdale st and it used to have some of the nicest city buildings. Now they have built a 20+ storey apartment block which is just square, no setbacks and the ugliest thing you have ever seen.