City campus site an ‘exciting’ opportunity
‘‘We’re really keen to have Ward St become an exciting and vibrant part of the city and having a bunch of empty old buildings there is not helping.’’ Graeme Ward of Wintec, left
Waikato Institute of Technology (Wintec) has begun demolition of old buildings in central Hamilton.
AP Construction’s big machines and crews were busy last week clearing the line of nine sites from 145 to 179 Ward St.
Wintec director of infrastructure and assets Graeme Ward said the site would be an opportunity for someone to do ‘‘something exciting’’.
Wintec owns all the buildings and some of the land, with the remainder leased from Hamilton City Council.
Part of the site is currently car park, but two-thirds of it was formerly Wintec’s media arts faculty.
Ward said media arts had moved into mostly leased premises in Alexandra St in April 2014.
‘‘This coincided with a seismic assessment of the Ward St buildings, which showed that their performance was generally low. In the event of an earthquake the poor ones were at risk of collapse and may bring the other ones down too.
‘‘At Wintec we have a standard that no building will be less than 66 per cent of the new building code. And further, these weren’t modern teaching spaces of a standard we were happy to put students into.’’
Although Wintec has no firm plans for the significant centralcity site, Ward said it was in a great position to provide a new and attractive gateway to its campus.
‘‘There are some stunning opportunities to enhance the entrance to the campus with Hamilton Girls’ High School’s performing arts centre on one side, the recently developed Norris Ward Park, the PwC building on the Anglesea St corner, and Genesis Energy’s new headquarters nearby.
‘‘We’re really keen to have Ward St become an exciting and vibrant part of the city and having a bunch of empty old buildings there is not helping. So we’re clearing the site and preparing for better things.
‘‘It’s a nice flat site immediately adjacent to the campus. We would consider dealing with other people; the city council, community and developers, to add something of value to the city.’’
Demolition is expected to be completed by the end of April. The site would be cleared and maybe decorated with student art work in the interim, he said.
Meanwhile, the final touches – a car park and landscaping – are under way at Wintec’s Rotokauri campus and mark the completion of a five-year, $30 million-plus redevelopment of the institute’s key trades training centre.
The major reconfiguration has seen a 180 degree re-orientation of the site, including a new entrance created to integrate the campus into the quickly developing Rotokauri residential area and town centre.