20 November 2015

1000+ ACT Govt staff to move to Woden

| Charlotte
Join the conversation
10
Woden town centre

The ACT Government is seeking up to 15,500 sq m of office space in the Woden town centre for more than 1000 Access Canberra employees and ACT Health Directorate staff.

The ACT public service staff will move next year as part of a plan to streamline government operations and improve health services. The mainly administrative Health staff will be closer to the hospital and on one site.

They are currently working across the city in offices at sites including Curtin, Civic and at the Canberra Hospital.

The government is pitching it as “an important step by the ACT Government to boost Woden’s economy by bringing new customers to its restaurants, cafes and other businesses and service providers” too, and clearly such an influx of workers will be a benefit to commercial operators in the area.

Chief Minister Andrew Barr said the Government recognised the impact of the relocation of a number of Federal government agencies from the town centre.
“Having heard first hand from retailers at the inaugural Pop-up Cabinet event in Woden … I know this move will be a welcome relief to many retailers and is a sign of confidence in the area,” he said.

Minister for Health Simon Corbell said ACT Health administrative staff who do not provide a direct clinical service are currently located in various parts of the city.

“This move is an exciting step for ACT Health to co-locate non-clinical administrative functions in one location, close to the Canberra Hospital campus,” he said.

“Co-locating a range of administration staff at present dispersed across Canberra will deliver operational and cost efficiencies and will ensure that space on the Canberra Hospital campus is freed up for clinical services . This will allow the campus to continue to focus on delivering high-level public health services to the community.”

The Woden facilities will provide an improved southside presence for Access Canberra, incorporating a new shopfront that will make it easier and simpler for Canberrans to connect with ACT Government services.

The ACT Government will issue a Registration of Interest for the required office space this week, closing time at 5pm on 2 December 2015.

Join the conversation

10
All Comments
  • All Comments
  • Website Comments
LatestOldest

John Moulis said :

Callum Offices – a mistake from the start. For many years the road now known as Athllon Drive appeared on maps as a dotted line named Yarra Glen stretching from the Melrose Dr/Yamba Dr roundabout south and off the map. In the early 1970s it was decided to abandon the road, and a renowned architect was brought in to design the Woden CIT building (Callum Offices) right in the path of the abandoned Yarra Glen extension. There were to be overhead walkways to Woden Plaza and Phillip Offices. One walkway was partially built, it stopped dead and a staircase now leads to the ground.

In the late 1970s it was realised that the abandoned Yarra Glen extension was now needed to provide access to the new Tuggeranong suburbs, but thanks to Callum Offices that section couldn’t be built and it had to stop dead at Hindmarsh Dr, thus robbing the road of its intended purpose of providing direct access from Civic to Tuggeranong. Undeterred, the planners realised that there had to be an arterial road between Civic and Tuggeranong so they extended Yamba Drive south past Long Gully Road and linked it to Erindale Dr.

Isn’t Canberra planning wonderful! 🙂

Woden needs to be re-designed with a one-way ringroad instead of the current chaotic arrangement of dual-carriageways interrupted every few hundred metres by traffic lights.

Adelaide Avenue desperately needs an additional lane between Cotter Road and Hopetoun Circuit.
This would then take the pressure off the Melrose Dr/Yarra Glen roundabout so they could remove the deliberate congestion that has been designed into the road system there in order to constrict access to Yarra Glen in the morning.

Mind you, addressing the total chaos on Parkes Way every single morning is probably much higher up the list at this stage.

rosscoact said :

John Moulis said :

rosscoact said :

Leo61 said :

Didn’t ACTGOV move 400 Shared Services staff out of Woden to Gungahlin in May/June this year?

Yes, that was out of Callum Offices which really were unfit for purpose. The article in the paper today talks about Woden Gungahlin and City being the hubs although I don’t see any more jobs coming to Gunners.

I assume the Libs platform will include sacking public servants and replacing them with contractors?

Tuggers residents can respond below. 🙂

Callum Offices – a mistake from the start. For many years the road now known as Athllon Drive appeared on maps as a dotted line named Yarra Glen stretching from the Melrose Dr/Yamba Dr roundabout south and off the map. In the early 1970s it was decided to abandon the road, and a renowned architect was brought in to design the Woden CIT building (Callum Offices) right in the path of the abandoned Yarra Glen extension. There were to be overhead walkways to Woden Plaza and Phillip Offices. One walkway was partially built, it stopped dead and a staircase now leads to the ground.

In the late 1970s it was realised that the abandoned Yarra Glen extension was now needed to provide access to the new Tuggeranong suburbs, but thanks to Callum Offices that section couldn’t be built and it had to stop dead at Hindmarsh Dr, thus robbing the road of its intended purpose of providing direct access from Civic to Tuggeranong. Undeterred, the planners realised that there had to be an arterial road between Civic and Tuggeranong so they extended Yamba Drive south past Long Gully Road and linked it to Erindale Dr.

Isn’t Canberra planning wonderful! 🙂

And you can never knock it down because of the architectural merit. It would make a great venue for either laser tag/paintball or a garret for starving artists but not much else without slinging indecent amounts of money at it.

Just go under it.

rosscoact said :

John Moulis said :

rosscoact said :

Leo61 said :

Didn’t ACTGOV move 400 Shared Services staff out of Woden to Gungahlin in May/June this year?

Yes, that was out of Callum Offices which really were unfit for purpose. The article in the paper today talks about Woden Gungahlin and City being the hubs although I don’t see any more jobs coming to Gunners.

I assume the Libs platform will include sacking public servants and replacing them with contractors?

Tuggers residents can respond below. 🙂

Callum Offices – a mistake from the start. For many years the road now known as Athllon Drive appeared on maps as a dotted line named Yarra Glen stretching from the Melrose Dr/Yamba Dr roundabout south and off the map. In the early 1970s it was decided to abandon the road, and a renowned architect was brought in to design the Woden CIT building (Callum Offices) right in the path of the abandoned Yarra Glen extension. There were to be overhead walkways to Woden Plaza and Phillip Offices. One walkway was partially built, it stopped dead and a staircase now leads to the ground.

In the late 1970s it was realised that the abandoned Yarra Glen extension was now needed to provide access to the new Tuggeranong suburbs, but thanks to Callum Offices that section couldn’t be built and it had to stop dead at Hindmarsh Dr, thus robbing the road of its intended purpose of providing direct access from Civic to Tuggeranong. Undeterred, the planners realised that there had to be an arterial road between Civic and Tuggeranong so they extended Yamba Drive south past Long Gully Road and linked it to Erindale Dr.

Isn’t Canberra planning wonderful! 🙂

And you can never knock it down because of the architectural merit. It would make a great venue for either laser tag/paintball or a garret for starving artists but not much else without slinging indecent amounts of money at it.

I actually love the building, and concrete is a brilliant product to build with, when the architect has imagination.
The trouble is, it needs maintenance and many potentially great concrete buildings are ruined because the owners never bother to spend a penny on them and eventually they become unfit for purpose. I hear that Callam Offices went the same way, ruined through neglect.

John Moulis said :

rosscoact said :

Leo61 said :

Didn’t ACTGOV move 400 Shared Services staff out of Woden to Gungahlin in May/June this year?

Yes, that was out of Callum Offices which really were unfit for purpose. The article in the paper today talks about Woden Gungahlin and City being the hubs although I don’t see any more jobs coming to Gunners.

I assume the Libs platform will include sacking public servants and replacing them with contractors?

Tuggers residents can respond below. 🙂

Callum Offices – a mistake from the start. For many years the road now known as Athllon Drive appeared on maps as a dotted line named Yarra Glen stretching from the Melrose Dr/Yamba Dr roundabout south and off the map. In the early 1970s it was decided to abandon the road, and a renowned architect was brought in to design the Woden CIT building (Callum Offices) right in the path of the abandoned Yarra Glen extension. There were to be overhead walkways to Woden Plaza and Phillip Offices. One walkway was partially built, it stopped dead and a staircase now leads to the ground.

In the late 1970s it was realised that the abandoned Yarra Glen extension was now needed to provide access to the new Tuggeranong suburbs, but thanks to Callum Offices that section couldn’t be built and it had to stop dead at Hindmarsh Dr, thus robbing the road of its intended purpose of providing direct access from Civic to Tuggeranong. Undeterred, the planners realised that there had to be an arterial road between Civic and Tuggeranong so they extended Yamba Drive south past Long Gully Road and linked it to Erindale Dr.

Isn’t Canberra planning wonderful! 🙂

And you can never knock it down because of the architectural merit. It would make a great venue for either laser tag/paintball or a garret for starving artists but not much else without slinging indecent amounts of money at it.

rosscoact said :

Leo61 said :

Didn’t ACTGOV move 400 Shared Services staff out of Woden to Gungahlin in May/June this year?

Yes, that was out of Callum Offices which really were unfit for purpose. The article in the paper today talks about Woden Gungahlin and City being the hubs although I don’t see any more jobs coming to Gunners.

I assume the Libs platform will include sacking public servants and replacing them with contractors?

Tuggers residents can respond below. 🙂

Callum Offices – a mistake from the start. For many years the road now known as Athllon Drive appeared on maps as a dotted line named Yarra Glen stretching from the Melrose Dr/Yamba Dr roundabout south and off the map. In the early 1970s it was decided to abandon the road, and a renowned architect was brought in to design the Woden CIT building (Callum Offices) right in the path of the abandoned Yarra Glen extension. There were to be overhead walkways to Woden Plaza and Phillip Offices. One walkway was partially built, it stopped dead and a staircase now leads to the ground.

In the late 1970s it was realised that the abandoned Yarra Glen extension was now needed to provide access to the new Tuggeranong suburbs, but thanks to Callum Offices that section couldn’t be built and it had to stop dead at Hindmarsh Dr, thus robbing the road of its intended purpose of providing direct access from Civic to Tuggeranong. Undeterred, the planners realised that there had to be an arterial road between Civic and Tuggeranong so they extended Yamba Drive south past Long Gully Road and linked it to Erindale Dr.

Isn’t Canberra planning wonderful! 🙂

Leo61 said :

Didn’t ACTGOV move 400 Shared Services staff out of Woden to Gungahlin in May/June this year?

Yes, that was out of Callum Offices which really were unfit for purpose. The article in the paper today talks about Woden Gungahlin and City being the hubs although I don’t see any more jobs coming to Gunners.

I assume the Libs platform will include sacking public servants and replacing them with contractors?

Tuggers residents can respond below. 🙂

Didn’t ACTGOV move 400 Shared Services staff out of Woden to Gungahlin in May/June this year?

Looks like somebody finally understands the concept of strategic thinking, they’ve ground themselves to a standstill with all the short term rubbish that goes on in health, politicians included.

wildturkeycanoe said :

Finally something being done right. I just hope most of the staff are locals and won’t need to travel from afar.

They will probably be hand-picked residents from Gungahlin so that they will have to catch the tram to City and then bus it to Woden.
Perhaps that is why Andrew Barr used the word “exciting”.

wildturkeycanoe2:57 pm 17 Nov 15

Finally something being done right. I just hope most of the staff are locals and won’t need to travel from afar.

Daily Digest

Want the best Canberra news delivered daily? Every day we package the most popular Riotact stories and send them straight to your inbox. Sign-up now for trusted local news that will never be behind a paywall.

By submitting your email address you are agreeing to Region Group's terms and conditions and privacy policy.