[U/C] Adelaide Festival Theatre Redevelopment

[crawf]

The Hayek sculptures have been almost universally hated since they were built. They are filthy.

The government should simply get rid of it all, and grass the area with a few trees here and there. Would look much more pleasant!

Nah theres enough grass along the Torrens and in the parklands. I say transform it into a meeting place.

[.::G!oRgOs::.]

But it already is a meeting place...or atleast supposed to be.

[bdm]

The Hayek sculptures have been almost universally hated since they were built. They are filthy.

The government should simply get rid of it all, and grass the area with a few trees here and there. Would look much more pleasant!

Nah theres enough grass along the Torrens and in the parklands. I say transform it into a meeting place.

Yes, imagine a big grassed area, trees on the surrounds, and in the middle a statue/sculpture with a good bit of pavers/whatever around it for a focal point, for a crowd to assemble.

[AtD]

The 'sculptures' are actually exhaust towers for the car park under the plaza.

[rev]

So we have heritage listed exhaust vents basically?

[tambi]

I think turning the plaza into something like Fed Square is a fantastic idea. It would get numbers down to the festival theatre precinct and there would then be a reason to put cafes/restaurants/bars down by the river. Elder park is great but the whole festival centre precinct is so underutilised and really is dead space, the whole area lacks cohesion. You can walk down there in the middle of the day and not see anybody, it's actually a bit creepy.

[alfer7_3]

shit this area has got so much potential to be such an important meeting point. its so close to the railway station and the centre of the city, the casino and the festival centre. it should be the focus of adelaides cultural precinct just like federation square in melbourne and be a very busy place some extent like southbank in brisbane or darling harbour or circular quay in sdyney. right now its just used as a monument than a meeting place. if somehow the festival centre and casino could be better connected to this area some sort of facility which could allow it to be used during the fringe and adelaide festivals and have some oudoor bars and resturants.

[Matt]

Given it's position, it's a farce that it hasn't been developed already.

[Matt]

Just looking at your pics of Fed Square again.
I love that place.
Such a brilliant, vibrant place for people to gather.

With a revamped Riverbank (restaurants, bars, etc), I reckon this would really work for Adelaide and the Festival Centre precinct.

Imagine a big screen or two down there, with a redeveloped plaza, 20 odd thousand people and a thriving developed Riverbank with packed restaurants and bars?

I can't believe how wasted the entire area is at the moment. The Torrens is our 'jewel' - the entire area is screaming to be utilised properly if some people with an actual vision are prepared to act.

[AdelaideAlive]

blast from the past

V__5C81.jpg (160.29 KiB) Viewed 4004 times

[pushbutton]

I went to see the (fantastic) Chitty Chitty Bang Bang show last week and had to ask 3 people to find my way into the theatre! It's just a concrete maze (but not in a fun way) and as for the sculptures I find it hard to believe they could be heritage listed. The silver diamond thingies are ok I suppose but those white odd-shaped columns with the red, blue, and yellow faded paint surely must go!

With a bit of imagination the space could be used for any number of tourist attractions, which would fit in very well since it's already sort of an entertainment precinct to some extent.

[pushbutton]

The Hayek sculptures have been almost universally hated since they were built. They are filthy.

The government should simply get rid of it all, and grass the area with a few trees here and there. Would look much more pleasant!

Nah theres enough grass along the Torrens and in the parklands. I say transform it into a meeting place.

Yes, imagine a big grassed area, trees on the surrounds, and in the middle a statue/sculpture with a good bit of pavers/whatever around it for a focal point, for a crowd to assemble.

Well that would provide a basic starting point on which to build I suppose, but by itself it would not attract me to use it. There has to actually be interesting, enjoyable things to actually DO!

[Goya's Line]

Actually finishing the Hajek sculptures as he intended would help - loads of vegetation to soften the cement. It's like blaming the architect if Adelaide Oval was left in it's current state of construction.

[Shahkar]

Adelaide’s arts infrastructure “far behind” other cities: Steel

ADELAIDE Festival Centre’s inaugural boss Anthony Steel says the Festival State is now “very, very far behind” the nation’s other arts capitals after years of underinvestment in arts infrastructure.

Steel is calling on the State Government to commit to funding the Adelaide Festival Centre’s $400 million redevelopment.

A plan for the redevelopment has been on Cabinet’s desk for nine months. This week Arts Minister Jay Weatherill’s office declined to rule the funding in or out of next month’s budget.

Steel, who was the Festival Centre’s first general manager when it opened in 1973, branded the lack of funding for the redevelopment “completely ridiculous”.

“Adelaide has fallen way behind every other mainland capital in its arts infrastructure. Very, very far behind.

“There’s no other capital city on the mainland that hasn’t spent millions and millions and millions on arts infrastructure in the last few years. We go on calling ourselves the festival state, and it’s completely ridiculous to me that the Festival Centre should not be right in the middle of all these plans and consulted the whole way along the line and taken extremely seriously.

“If there are to be additions to the infrastructure … the point surely is that now is the chance, now is the opportunity because there’s great big upheaval in that part of town, and this is the time to be part of it.”

In March current Festival Centre CEO Douglas Gautier told Indaily he was still in negotiations with the State Government over funding for the redevelopment.

“That went up last year, to the government, and all those plans are still sitting with them for consideration,” Gautier said. “And that’s where it is, really.

“There’s a priority list. I think that investment in the Oval and the Convention Centre is good. It’s a rising tide which will carry all boats, including ours hopefully.”

While Gautier was carefully measured in his comments, Steel lambasted the State Government for not taking the Festival Centre seriously.

“They need to feel, I think above all else, that they are taken seriously as part of the riverbank plan, the upgrade of the precinct.

“Because at the moment I think I’m right in saying that they feel very much an add-on to all of that.

“And that the decision makers don’t seem to recognise what a major asset to the city and community it is.”

A submission to a parliamentary committee in March by the Festival Centre gives some clue as to the condition of its buildings.

The Festival Centre made a successful submission for several million dollars of government funding to “address the most critical and highest risk items”.

These included that:

· The centralised emergency systems present hazards from potentially unstable materials (lead acid batteries)

· Some carpets are past their useful life and present trip hazards and air quality hazards

· Failing mechanical services, such as lifts and air conditioning equipment, present hazards to the wellbeing of building occupants and visitors

· Increasing instances of air-conditioning failures and electrical faults are likely to result in cancellation of performances, leading to loss of income and a requirement to pay compensation

· Essential items of plant are beyond their useful life; plant repair costs are no longer sustainable and in some instances, service contractors have advised that the replacement parts are no longer available.

[arki]

As I have said several times before, the major problem with the entire riverbank precinct is that it is completely disjointed. This is especially true of the festival centre which has become completely detached from the festival plaza itself. Take a look at the precinct in the early 90s.




And look at it now


Notice how in the earlier photos the plaza and centre are cohesively joined together. They completely screwed up the continuity when they hacked away at the precinct in the early 2000s. The plaza is now so detached from the river that it may as well be located on the other end of the city. Now the only link between the two sections is a small pedestrian bridge which looks superfluous and completely out of place with its surrounds. The other major problem with this is the lack of connectivity between the plaza and the station/casino which should have been rectified in the 2001 redevelopment. As someone else pointed out it is literally like a maze going from one end of the riverbank precinct to another.