Letters to the Editor
Tasmaniantimes.com.au
HOBART TAS 7000
28th August, 2015,
Loss of Hobart’s Architectural Heritage
I refer to the article “Call to save Hobart’s architectural ‘gems’ (Sunday Tasmanian, 23rd August, 2015, here) in which notable Tasmanian architects bemoaned the loss of important twentieth century architectural buildings: the so-called “gems of ‘unloved modernism’”.
The former 1970s Motors showroom (now Myer, Macquarie Street), is an award-winning building. The fact that the building could be utilised as both a car showroom and a retail outlet for a major chain indicates just how well the architect succeeded in producing a modern structure that not only respected the surrounding Georgian colonial and Victorian architecture but that was adaptable to other uses.
Actually, the award was made by the Royal Australian Institute of Architects (Tasmania), the professional body representing architects. The Motors building was recognised as an important element of late 20th Century architecture and the building listed in its book of important Hobart buildings.
The recent decision by Hobart City Council aldermen to disregard both the Council’s own officer report, recommending refusal of the contentious development for an eleven storey hotel on the site next to the historic former Hutchins School, and their decision to ignore the HCC’s own planning scheme’s height restrictions for this part of the CBD flies in the face of commonsense and farsightedness.
Hobart has long since matured and eschewed the need to emulate Mainland capital cities’ destruction of their built heritage. MONA and our amazing collection of heritage buildings are what drives tourism in this City, not “me-too” buildings found anywhere else in the World. Whilst there is no argument that additional hotel beds are needed in Hobart, this visionless recourse to high rise as the only solution is to be condemned in the strongest terms possible.
The Lord Mayor, Ald. Hickey, is on record as expressing her distress over losing the Motors building. She also said that she believed …”Hobart needed to embrace tall hotels”. The Lord Mayor also contradicted the professional architectural opinion that high rise should be kept outside the heritage precinct. Who are the experts here?
It is the people of Tasmania who will be the long-term losers over this issue which has dogged planning and development in Hobart for far too long; the current group of decision- makers will long since have departed the scene but Tasmanians will have to live with the consequences of their ignorant and visionless decisions.
The absence of any comment from the RAIA (TAS) over the wanton destruction of this 1970s “architectural ‘gem“ is disgraceful and gutless. The Institute should hang its collective head in shame.
