Belconnen Markets Development - 16 level building plus two other towers of 8 levels

Bring it. Build it. I hope that Barr et al ignore the nimby objections – they probably would have voted Green anyway Andrew so vote leakage minimal!

The housing development policy in this town is bordering on the insane – all the boomers get to live on quarter acre blocks close to the city or main town centres while teeny weeny blocks and apartments get built in the middle of nowhere with no infrastructure to speak of. A little bit of rebalancing of that policy is long overdue.

What is the problem with buildings casting shadows? Trees cast shadows, as do clouds, and so do single storey buildings. Yet we barely give it a second thought.

damien haas said :

I am aware there are some issues with the retail space in new residential developments – for example, i couldnt open an office in one of the spaces – it has to be retail for some reason. i heard Nektar Efkarpidis talk about those challenges at a forum last year (he has some interesting thoughts on development in Canberra) but overall, these developments are positive for Belconnen.

I really don’t see what role the government has in telling people whether they can use a certain room or set of rooms for residential, retail or office space… As long as they aren’t harming the neighbours, say by unreasonably disturbing them, who cares what people do.

The same goes for building apartment buildings. Unless it causes a lot more harm than casting a shadow or offending aabernathy’s sense of what kind of building he/she would like to live in, then I don’t really see why government should stop someone from building such a structure.

Interesting point about the commercial shopfronts at the base of these developments. It is a good thing. One of the major problems with the Belconnen Town Centre is that in the past Westfield had assumed defacto town centre status. When people could shop, the place had life. When Westfield was closed – it was empty. There are no businesses facing ‘out’ of Westfield Belconnen.

If you look at how popular Emu Bank has become, imagine if that extended to other parts of Belconnen. Some parts of the trades and services area have a great deal of life past 5PM, such as the area where the pot belly and several restaraunts are. It would be great to see a linkage of all these areas of post-westfield trading hours activity at some point in the future.

I am aware there are some issues with the retail space in new residential developments – for example, i couldnt open an office in one of the spaces – it has to be retail for some reason. i heard Nektar Efkarpidis talk about those challenges at a forum last year (he has some interesting thoughts on development in Canberra) but overall, these developments are positive for Belconnen.

My main concern is that appropriate public transport infrastructure be built for these new residents. That whole area is experiencing considerable traffic and passenger volume increases, and the current road is a bottleneck. Im not sure more parking is the answer – but better public transport access in a central point for the markets and new resident and office space commuters would be good.

The current Belconnen masterplan is nearing its completion and the Belconnen Community Council will be working on a new ideas in 2012 to apply for the next 20 years or so, to feed into the next masterplan.

I’m all for them.

Will be great for the markets and surrounding shopping having all those customers living right there.
Great for Belco, well done

I’m glad they are allowing some higher density housing built close to city centres. I think that building up is definitely a much better solution than building out.

What’s the problem? This is a sorely-needed urban infill project that will supply lower-cost housing to first home buyers, yadda yadda yadda ….! 😉
As with all things that may seem odd, simply follow the money I suppose.
The question is, why do all apartments they build now have to have commercial shopfronts at the bottom?? A lot/most of them appear to remain empty… e.g New ones where Jamo garden centre was, the ones built on Benjamin way (old Cameron office carpark?). What shops are supposed to buy/rent these places? As there is no decent parking, i’m guessing they expect cafes or similar for the residents?

You make some good points, in particular the road between the markets and bunnings. Why that was not built as a straighter double lane road I will never know.

However the rest of your post seems like Nimby melodrama, especially the bit about shadows being cast on residents already there and having people looking into their back yards. Gee have a look at the houses that will be effected, certainly aint much to be looking into. As for shadows again won’t cause all that much when you actually look at where the buildings are planned in relation to the sun. I reckon the only time any shaddow will be on houses is late in a summers afternoon, which may well be welcomed by many. Other than that a summer morning shadow will be towards the market and in winter more towards Belconnen way.