Residents vow to fight unreasonable development plans

THE Ramsay Health Clinic at New Farm usually receives accolades for helping people get over their hurts, habits and hang-ups but it is being challenged on a number of fronts on planned extensions.

The 90-bed psychiatric private hospital, credited with having turned former Brisbane Lions Australian rules bad boy footballer Brendan Fevola’s life around, is to be extended.

The clinic, which is bounded by Oxlade Drive, Sargent Street and Mountford Road, on the point of the New Farm Peninsula, is owned by Ramsay Health Care, which is regarded as one of the largest private hospital operators in Australia.

The New Farm Clinic was purpose built in 1986 as a replacement for an older facility and recently underwent a major refurbishment and expansion program with an additional 16 beds, additional car parking, group rooms and executive suites.

The original plans to redevelop the remaining section of the hospital would see it expand to 42 beds in a building that was 19m high. Angry nearby residents said the height of the building would ruin the character of the area.

Residents, at a recent public meeting, said they were concerned their “sleepy, little area of New Farm” was to vanish as the clinic grew and became increasingly busier.

Later at a meeting convened by ALP candidate for Brisbane City Council’s Central Ward, Paul Crowther and attended by clinic chief executive officer Ken Craig, Ramsay Health Care’s state development manager Dean Clough and an architect.

Mr Craig said that, in recognition of the “excellent relationship” that had existed between the hospital and the community of the area for 25 years, clinic management had engaged with the community about development “in good faith”.

Mr Crowther said he wanted to ensure the views of all stakeholders were heard and what eventually was constructed was the culmination of those discussions.

The original development application was put to council in August last year.

Ramsay said there was a growing demand for mental health services in Brisbane and the clinic needed to expand to meet that need.

Mr Crowther said it was not his intention to have the redevelopment stopped, which the locals wanted.

“We have already saved a significant fig tree on the site that was planned to be removed and this is a major victory for the local community,” he said.

Mr Crowther said residents received concessions and commitments from the clinic at the meeting on a range of issues including noise levels, landscaping, the building height and maintaining the character of the area.

He said the original plans were that the building would be 19m high. After discussion at the meeting, it was agreed the three-level building would be reduced to less than 14m high. One level would be for car parking.

Eaves would be added to better reflect the character of the suburb and the roof would be non-glare with a darker colour in keeping with others in the neighbourhood.

While residents fear the extra patronage the clinic will create a parking shortage on the streets, little headway was made on that issue.

The small “park” on the corner is to be maintained “as is” and not the large concrete wall as the original plans indicated.

The clinic said there would not be any more day programs after the re-development. The new rooms being built were to compensate for the loss of consulting rooms in the main building, which was to be retrofitted for increased administration.

During construction, the clinic day programs and consulting rooms are to be temporarily relocated to another site.

Concerned residents have formed the New Farm Clinic Neighbourhood Group (NFCNG) to collectively and efficiently express their concerns to Council, planners and the New Farm Clinic.

Any residents wanting further information on the proposed development can contact Paul Crowther on 0411 516 635 or email him at paul@raysmith.com.au

Brewery owners toast move to a new area

BRISBANE entrepreneurs Adrian Slaughter and Marc Chrismas are excited about the opportunity to open a boutique micro-brewery on Helen Street at Teneriffe.

The pair said they were excited about joining the “vibrant and dynamic” peninsula community, following their proposal to open the Green Beacon Brewing Company in one of the street’s historic warehouses.

“It has been a dream of mine to run a small business that’s integral to the community,” Adrian said, highlighting his desire to be an “economic driver for the community”.

“Now that were engaging all our contractors, all the people employing in this will be locals. Our electrical, structural and hydraulic engineers to our architectural firm, they’re very happy for business to be coming their way,” he said.

Adrian said he respected nearby residents’ concerns about the brewery’s licensing terms.

He was adamant about keeping the brewery a boutique venue distinctly opposite to the infamous venues in Fortitude Valley and that the wholesale licence Green Beacon had applied for only allowed it to sell its own hand-crafted ales.

“We’re not going for commercial hotel licensing. We’re not a bar. We’re a cellar door for a micro-brewery that’s going to have less community impact than many other businesses (in the area).

“There will be zero emission: No odour and zero noise,” Adrian said. “We’re working with the most state-of-the-art equipment from the United States we can get our hands on.”

Working as “the antipathy of rowdy pubs”, the boutique venue, will “engage” customers by complementing their drinks with local seafood, served fresh as there will be no cooking facilities available on premises.

“It will be a place where people can stroll in on foot, see the product, talk to the brewer while enjoying some local oysters, prawns and red claw,” Adrian said. “We want to know our locals, see them down there a lot and we want to be involved in activities in the peninsula (such as the Teneriffe Festival).”

A range of different hops varieties is to be available through pale and bright ales, traditional porters, stouts, wheat beers and potentially seasonal ales at the brewery.

At the time this issue went to press, a mediation and consultation between Green Beacon and residents who opposed the liquor licence was to take place.

Liquor and Gaming Specialists director Matthew Jones said the meeting was to be positive and the final step to the formal process of the application.

“The (LGS) chief executive will now consider whether the application passes by the coupling of documents, which could take a number of weeks,” Matthew said.

The liquor application posted outside 26 Helen Street indicated the licencing hours were 10am to midnight, seven days a week but Green Beacon said the actual opening hours, which were mutually exclusive from the licencing hours, would not be determined until a later date by LGS.

Should the application be approved, Adrian and Marc said they hoped to retain the face of the warehouse while interior works were anticipated to begin next month.

Businesses suffer as factions close overhead walkway

THE Valley Chamber of Commerce has called for a speedy resolution to the war above Wickham Street over the walkway which is denying the public access to the Fortitude Valley railway station and affecting surrounding traders.

Chamber president Charles Apostolos said businesses in the area were slowly being strangled while the dispute over repairs to the 20m overpass is resolved.

The walkway links the derelict L-shaped Walton Building and the McWhirters Building. It has been closed since early December.

Mr Apostolos said he had tried to have the dispute resolved in time for the beginning of the new school year as many students from the nearby All Hallows day school for girls used the bridge to get to and from the station and their school.

The students are among an estimated 4000 who used the bridge daily. Commuters now are forced to use the Brunswick Street entrance to the railway station.

Media reports indicate the dispute is between the owners of the Walton Building, Mount Cathay Pty Ltd, and landlord, Happy Valley Pty Ltd, and that the root of the fracas was between landowner Dr Chiu Fan Lee and Happy Valley’s Jack Moc.

Mr Apostolos said the standoff had become and local and state election issue.

“It’s a council and State Government issue. Someone’s got to seek to resolve it,” Mr Apostolos said. “All parties need to sit down together and address it.”

He said he had spoken with Waltons “go between man” to try (“begging and begging”) to speak with Dr Lee’s to get the bridge open again, with no success. Even members of the Chinese community have been approached to intervene.

Brisbane City Council has been trying to negotiate with all parties involved to achieve a resolution and to get the Waltons building refurbished and re-tenanted even threatening fines for non-compliance.

Council wants the building given a facelift because the vacant premises had become a blight on the landscape that is the heart of the Fortitude Valley Entertainment Precinct. A lick of paint on the façade late last year did not impress the council.

Mr Apostolos said he wanted the issue to become and election issue – and it has.

Both major parties with the State Government and the council are sparring over who has done the least and who has failed in their duty to bring about resolution.

State member for Brisbane Central, Grace Grace, said the issue had been coming to a head for about 30 years because a previous state government had not sought to secure the access rights for the walkway to the bridge.

Her challenger for the seat, the LNP’s Rob Cavallucci, said the argument was over the original easement documents which meant the State Government could intervene as that was an area over which it had control.

He said that, if the current State Government stopped blaming previous administrations and dealt with it before now, the current standoff would not have eventuated.

“Ultimately, it’s a private matter between two private entities. No one other than those two parties can do anything about it,” Mr Cavallucci said.

Asa escapes the daily grind to paint coffee evolution mural

TENERIFFE artist Asa Boardman has spread his creativity on the wall of the new Grinders Coffeestate headquarters at Newstead.

The 32-year-old owner of Pony Cat cafe, at New Farm, was commissioned to spray-paint a mural on the back wall of the retail showroom and boutique coffee shop, which he completed in three days.

“I came up with the idea of the evolution of coffee. We started at the coffee in its natural state, then the Ethiopian goat herder who discovered it, to the East Indian tradesman, then the Italian monks who were roasting it,” Asa said. “Then, off to when it goes to the barista machine with different French lattes, onto the little guy on a bike with his takeaway coffee.”

The new headquarters, which opened last month, is in an iconic warehouse once home to Sol Breads.

Asa said he liked the freedom of graffiti art, which could carry him away, even with no professional art training, with bringing his creativity to life.

“It’s kind of like once you get on a roll, you keep going,” he said. “You have an idea of what you want to do in your head and let it flow. You don’t have a set picture and you just do it.”

Asa is one of eight artists occupying a sizeable gallery and studio space at Love, Love Studios on Florence Street.

Grinders Coffee is on the corner of Florence Street and Commercial Road, Newstead. Telephone 3257 4829 or log on to www.grinderscoffee.com.au for wholesale inquiries.

Fixed Riverwalk an eyesore, easily damaged: resident

BRISBANE City Council’s proposal to reconstruct the section of its Riverwalk washed away in last year’s Brisbane River flood will be an eyesore and at greater risk of damage in other floods.

Eileen Collins, who lives on the edge of the river at New Farm, said there had been no official inquiry into the failure of the original design – a floating structure which rose and fell with the tide and general river movement – and that the chosen fixed structure would increase the risk of greater damage during future floods.

“I’ve heard engineers say: ‘Why would they do that?’ because it doesn’t ride with the tide. All the debris is going to be locked inside it,” Eileen said.

“Our concern is that it’s going to be another eyesore, not an icon.

Many waterfront residents received letters from the Brisbane City Council in August last year, outlining five concepts for  the new Riverwalk – two floating, two fixed and one retaining wall – before announcing in November its preferred option, which would be anchored into the riverbed.

Eileen said she was concerned for the river and that a concrete eyesore would not make a good replacement for the original floating design.

“From what I could make out, they (the couplings joining the platforms together) would still be there if they weren’t jutting out into the river from one particular area and if they had gotten better linkage between the different platforms,” Eileen said.

She said the original walkway was more attractive and her research showed many floating structures around the world had withstood natural disasters.

“To the committee who put the last design in, my question is: ‘Who are they and what are their qualifications?’ because they were the ones who put the (failed) design in last time,” Eileen said.

Central Ward councillor David Hinchliffe fully supports the new Riverwalk.

He said he told council Infrastructure Committee chairman councillor Margaret De Wit that he would do “all he could” to see that a “sound, safe and feasible” Riverwalk was constructed as soon as possible.

“The advice I’ve received is that it has been totally drafted by engineers and to take account of flooding. I do not think that the current project constitutes as rushing at all,” Cr Hinchliffe said.

Cr De Wit declined an invitation to comment but a council media representative said council had consulted structural engineering firm Arup to conduct a full review of the cause of failure of the last design in April 2011.

They concluded the main cause of the failure was “debris becoming trapped in the opening span” which placed a heavy load on the structure, causing it to break away.

“A hydraulic modelling report determined the impacts that each Riverwalk option would have on the Brisbane River flood behaviour,” he said. “This report demonstrated there was no significant difference between the fixed option the original floating Riverwalk.”

He said the chosen fixed structure scored well in terms of capital and maintenance cost, flood resilience, security and privacy.

Construction on the new $70 million section of Riverwalk is expected to begin early next year and be completed by mid-2014.