Page 1913 - Week 07 - Thursday, 23 August 2007
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This is a fairly vibrant precinct. It is an important precinct for people of the south in particular, and most particularly those of the Woden Valley. In the context of this variation, we have to look at what kind of vision we have for the Woden town centre. Whilst we have the Woden town centre master plan and other planning documents that deal with this, we need to decide what we want to see in 10 or 15 years time. What I would like to see is a very vibrant town centre which has many more people living there and much more commercial activity. At the same time, if we are going to bring in those uses and encourage people to be living in this town centre—which I think we should—it is incumbent on us to protect some of those recreational facilities.
It is no good having wall-to-wall apartments and commercial office blocks without preserving some of the important open space which people, in Canberra particularly, really value. We do not want to see the sort of situation we see in large cities around the world where there is so much development that it is just wall-to-wall apartments and wall-to-wall office blocks without preserving what the community values. We want to make this a good place to live. We want to make it an attractive place for Canberrans to live in medium and high-density housing. We want to make it an attractive place to work. If, in this particular precinct north of Launceston Street, we allow the ability to take away some of these recreational facilities, it will take away from the vibrancy of the Woden town centre.
I would want to see more development in other parts of Woden, around the retail core. I make no bones about that. I would want to see more commercial office space and more residential space than even what has been planned for at the moment. But this is where we need to strike the balance. I do not think that this is the place where we should necessarily be concentrating most of the commercial development; that should be more around the retail core on the other side of Launceston Street.
Given that we have here an opportunity to protect a recreational precinct, the government should take another look at it. They should take another look at this precinct with a view to ensuring that it is vibrant. That does not mean that there should not be some commercial development there, but we need to look at whether we are going to lose most or a lot of the recreational facilities that are in this area. That is a legitimate concern to the people of the Woden Valley—and the people of south Canberra generally, because the Woden town centre is utilised in one form or another by people on the south side of Canberra.
The issue is important. I do not think that the government had ill will in seeking to remove some of these facilities. But we must look at the outcome of this. I note that the southern cross club has concerns. It has a lease for only a couple more years, I think. After that time we do not know what could happen to its facilities; we do not know what kind of redevelopment could go on there. Members of the community may well lose some important facilities.
The minister alluded to other potential areas for some of these recreational facilities. We would like to see them. We would certainly be interested in hearing what the government’s plans are in relation to some other areas where these could be sited. As it stands, we have some important recreational facilities. There is a need to allow
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