Now: Regent Square
Then: Old George Town
PETITION TO SAVE REGENT SQUARE
A petition to Parliament is the latest round in the battle to save George Town’s historic Regent Square. This has been continuing since a Government proposal to place a large building on the square to house LINC, Service Tasmania shop and Child and Family Centre became public in August 2010.
Regent Square is the central public square for George Town. It had its 200th birthday last December and is arguably Tasmania’s oldest public park.
It was the central square for the grid-planned ‘George Town’ that Governor Lachlan Macquarie founded in 1811 to be the Headquarters for Northern Tasmania, which role George Town had from 1819 until 1825.
Such squares were a feature of the nine towns Macquarie founded in NSW and VDL in 1810 – 11. All were surveyed by James Meehan, following Macquarie’s precise instructions on their layout. Today only five of these squares are left and Regent Square and New Norfolk’s Arthur Square are two of the three squares to be intact within their original borders. All the others have been reduced in size and reshaped by later developments.
A public meeting of around 200 people held at George Town in late December 2011 overwhelmingly voted to oppose the Government’s proposal and to retain the Square as “open space”.
An appeal against the Education Department’s development on Regent Square was upheld by the Resource Management Planning Appeal Tribunal in early March.
Less than a fortnight after the RMPAT decision was advised, the George Town Council approved a new Draft Planning Scheme that will allow buildings on 40% of Regent Square as a permitted use. Councillors will have no right to refuse a development proposal, and there will be no right to make submissions or appeal. This new scheme is now before the Government for approval.
An application for listing Regent Square on the Tasmanian Heritage Register first made in Oct 2010, is now being assessed, but that will not necessarily stop buildings being developed on Regent Square.
The only way Regent Square can be preserved intact is if the Government realises the people’s concern about this development and relocates it to another site.
The petition asks the Legislative Council to
1. Ensure that Regent Square’s heritage and cultural values are recognised
2. Support the community’s wish to preserve Regent Square as public open space, with no further buildings
3. Keep the LINC and Service Tasmania Shop in their present location and place the Child and Family Centre on a new site.
The petition is on the Legislative Council’s website at
http://www.parliament.tas.gov.au/EPetitions/Council/CurrentEPetitions.aspx?LIndex=2
