The submarine base
The dollars and sense of adaptive-reuse developments don’t always stack up. Sometimes lengthy approval processes send developers broke – several different developers have owned Pentridge (see previous page) since it was subdivided in 2001 – and it can be prohibitively expensive to remediate a site, which often involves removing hazardous materials.
Mary Darwell, executive director of the Sydney Harbour Federation Trust, which has overseen the transformation of heritage sites such as Cockatoo Island, says it cost $46 million to remove pollutants from Sub Base Platypus at Neutral Bay. The site was a gasworks plant before operating as a torpedo factory then submarine base for the Royal Australian Navy between 1942 and 1999.
Commercial tenants are moving in to two industrial buildings at Sub Base Platypus. The Trust believes the revenue will help restore other harbourside locations.
Darwell says for such sites to have a future, it’s vital to attract crowds to shop, eat, work, picnic and stay. She wants visitors “to be active during the day and into the early evening, with programmed activities but also opportunities for people to find their own leisure in the space”.
“Gentrification is driven by people who take ownership of a place and create an improved environment,” says Dermot Lowry, partner and head of occupier services for property experts Knight Frank. “Reputation change is actually people-driven.”