Christie’s height hint riles

HOBART Alderman Jeff Briscoe says Lord Mayor Ron Christie’s latest comments make the council look like a “bunch of amateurs”.

Yesterday, while promoting the council’s new city vision — Hobart: A Community Vision for our island capital — Lord Mayor Ron Christie said the council had been briefed on ar- chitect Leigh Woolley’s report into building heights.

Ald Christie hinted the draft document, which was subject to change, said buildings in the Hobart CBD could be restricted to 60m with no room for discretion.

At present, the interim planning scheme has a maximum height of 45m in the CBD with discretion allowed.

Ald Briscoe said it was “very poor form” for the mayor to make the comments before the council had received qualified advice.

“The director of planning was unaware that the mayor was going to make any comment about the Leigh Woolley report,” he said.

“The report has been sent to the urban design panel for their comments.

“Then we were going to have qualified advice from them and planning officers before it went to the council.

“It [mayor’s comments] does damage to the process and the council and makes us look like a bunch of amateurs.”

But Ald Christie has returned serve, saying “it’s unfortunate Ald Briscoe considers himself amateur”.

“I have not released any new information that the pub- lic does not already know,” he said. “When asked a question about high-rise buildings, I’m not going to lie or cover up to the community any information that relates to the brief.”

Ald Briscoe has called for the full report to be released immediately, and Alderman Anna Reynolds agreed.

“At this stage, the most important thing is that Mr Wool- ley’s report is released to the public so everyone can see his recommendations,” she said

“Sixty metres sounds less dramatic than the 120m of some recent proposals but 60m means a 20-storey building, and we don’t have many of those in Hobart city.”

Ald Christie said the full report would be released next month as scheduled and not before.