Page 4283 - Week 14 - Thursday, 24 October 1991
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Everywhere you go, if you walk from here into the city, you see offices; you do not see shops. To some degree, that is unavoidable, because I do not believe that Civic can sustain too many more commercial enterprises. Desirable as it is to have interesting shops at street level, with our decentralised town centres I do not believe that we can sustain too many more shops. I believe that we ought to be looking to get away from any more offices at street level.
Let me indicate some neglect of my duty, perhaps. Occasionally I walk through the Boulevard, the plaza a little way across the road. I note that for some time there has been work going on there. I have wondered - I have done no more than that - whether that new construction is going to see that ground level space being used for offices or whether we are going to continue to see shops at those levels. I can remember a range of shops along the Boulevard. The construction work is drawing near to completion and since being Minister I have not inquired what the purpose is. I hope that there are not going to be offices.
The Boulevard has never worked entirely successfully as an open and commercial area. If those shops are removed, it will almost spell the end of the Boulevard as any area of interest at all. Perhaps I should have taken a little more interest early on, although I guess the plans had already been approved before I came on the scene.
Mr Jensen: All in accordance with their lease.
MR WOOD: No doubt, Mr Jensen, in accordance with their lease. We do have too many offices at ground level. I will not repeat that theme.
What we need in Garema Place and in Civic, to carry through on the theme that Mr Stevenson has prompted, is more people. We can do that not by increasing offices but by increasing the number of people in the area. I believe that we need higher density living closer to Civic and, indeed, closer to the other town centres. The draft Territory Plan, if carried through, may provide one mechanism for that.
I also recall with interest the production of the document Sustainable Canberra, released about six months ago. That document, in common with lots of other proposals, suggested that there ought to be a lot more high density living adjacent to Civic. It may be that some of the car parks around the place could be converted to multistorey, high density living. That is an interesting proposal. It is one that is being quite well considered around the community now.
In that event, and if there are more people a little more distant perhaps from Civic, people would flow into Civic in greater numbers. We do not need Civic to be at its busiest simply at office times. That is certainly the case now.
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