50-52/54 Phillip Street New Hotel/Residential Building Stage 1 Concept DA

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Response attached

I have a number of concerns regarding this proposed project:
1. I own an office on the northwest side of BMA House which is in very close proximity to this new development. I concerned that noise created during the construction of the proposed new building will make my office unusable for medical consultations. I currently lease out a consulting room and I am concerned that the Tennant that leases this room will stop doing so due to noise.
2. I am concerned that the noise generated from the hotel's entrance being on Phillip Lane (which my office overlooks) will disrupt medical consultations from taking place in my office.
3. The office that I own is in an elevated position in BMA house and in the afternoon the sun streams in, making it a very pleasant place to work. The construction of a 48 storey building at 50-52 Phillip street will prevent the sun streaming in, making the office cold, dark and a less pleasant place to work. I anticipate this will decrease the value of the office.
4. The proposed hotel at 50-52 Phillip street will have its entrance in Phillip lane; with the traffic travelling in an easterly direction from Phillip street to Macquarie street along Phillip lane. This will massive increase the number of taxis, private vehicles and mini-buses using this lane. In addition, the proposed loading dock for the hotel will directly open on to the north/south running portion of Phillip lane; as a large hotel is proposed, this would be expected to greatly increase the traffic on this portion of Phillip lane. Removalist access to BMA House is via Phillip lane, not Macquarie street (transportation of large objects such as furniture or equipment is not permitted through the entrance foyer of BMA House due to concerns that such transportation would result in damage to the heritage listed internal foyer of this building or interrupt the throughfare of occupants and their clients). A substantial increase in traffic in Phillip lane would make occupants moving in or out of BMA House, or the receipt of large furniture or object deliveries, near impossible. This would be very disruptive and a difficult problem for occupants of BMA House to overcome.
5. During the construction of the proposed hotel at 50-52 Phillip street, I would anticipate that the construction workers would at time block vehicular access to Phillip lane, disrupting access for removalists and delivery people to BMA House.

For the past six years the owners in my building have lived surrounded by building projects on three sides of my unit block in Bridge Street - AMP and the Education buildings. This has caused tremendous stress and loss of income but speaking only for myself, I have been prepared to wear these negative impacts in exchange for the benefit of living in such a special area of Sydney. The improvements made by AMP are significant. I am not an anti-development person and welcome the renovation, improvement and updating of city buildings.
This proposed development does not fall into the welcome category. The idea of cantilevering some crude stepped construction over one of the most beautiful buildings in Sydney (50 Phillip Street) is a travesty and no council should entertain this design. It is appalling it's got to the stage where we have to actually say "enough is enough" to this design. Maximising the site for profit at the cost of our city's heritage isn't right - just because you can doesn't mean you should.
I am interested to see that the project's visual impact pictures appear to only pick angles which are the most "appealing". There are none from a raised position, such as from our building, which would reveal the full horror impact of this stepped design as we will look straight at it; no hiding the weird hanging cantilevered steps behind a street-level facade.
I am therefore certain we are not being given the full visual impact of this design and I strongly urge the council planners to reject it. If the developer cannot come up with a workable solution based on the 52 Phillip Street site alone, leaving 50 Phillips Street to remain in its glory, then so be it.

I have a unit at the Astor, adjacent to the proposed development.
The Astor is a listed building and I have considerable concerns that its fabric may be damaged by the ground works and massive weight proposed to be transferred in the ground from this massive tower. Any consent must include sufficient monitoring and protection of the Astor and indemnity against damage.
However, an even larger concern is that Phillip Lane is totally unsuited for additional traffic. It already discharged the contents of the multi story car park under Hudson House which then have to turn and exit onto Macquarie Street over a pavement kerb crossing. Phillip Lane is not even large enough for a refuse truck to make the turn at the corner of the Astor! The addition of the traffic from a major hotel is much to much for the Lane to carry and may result in a pedestrian being hurt on the pavement crossing at Macquarie Street. Any development should insist that traffic to the hotel is discharged back onto Phillip Street and not allowed to come out through Phillip Lane.

I was born in Sydney and have now lived here for 70 years. In that time, I have seen many changes made to the central city area. I remember when Bridge Street had beautiful colonial sandstone buildings along its entire length. What a treasure this should have been. We are unlikely to craft such fine buildings again. These buildings are part of my heritage as an Australian and I hate to see them go or be misused. I see, when I'm in Europe, how other countries value their history and heritage and how the old city areas are preserved as living history. Some European buildings are much older than ours, but they also value the beautiful buildings of the 19th century.
The Chief Secretary's Building is a beautiful building that should be preserved and treasured in its entirety. I have had occasion to visit some of the offices in this building and remember them as fine and grand. This is the last of the Bridge Street sandstones still in original condition and I am vehemently opposed to the construction of a modern tower on the site.

The later builders of the then-colony of New South Wales built with elegance,
and built to last. Their reasons were a deep civic pride, and a sure faith in the
future of our future Commonwwealth.

These structures may be recent arrivals in the history of global cities, but if not
in scale, their aesthetic stand with anything one can find elsewhere from the same
era. The structure at 50 Phillip Street was clearly intended to endure on its own
merits, and rightly so for the intent and the expense with which it was put up.

Therefore I object to this "concept" proposal as an insensitive urban vandalism that,
in my view, far outdoes the socially much-reviled graffiti that we all go on about. If
you wish to join the rather long list of Sydney's urban despoilers right back to the
Askin era, Mr Perrotet, I suppose I cannot do much other than observe that this is
not the legacy most voters in NSW might wish for themselves.

I rest my case; an emotional one by planning committe standards, perhaps, though
one that I will carry in my political choices in the future.

Yours, Fred Green PhD

I strongly object to the 50-52 Phillip Street New Hotel/Residential Building concept for demolition of the existing buildings/structure and construction of a new 47 storey, 331 bed hotel, including retail uses. It is economically and architecturally a terrible idea, driven by short-termism and political donors. As population growth subsides, we must relearn city planning and development, focus on sustainability over expansion.

I object to any development of this major heritage building/site. Once damaged and erased, Sydney's fine colonial history infrastructure cannot be replaced. Let some buildings remain as they were for this and future generations to visit and understand. Short-term moneymaking does not justify the massive alteration proposed.

This significant building is one of the few remaining of its type, at 66 years of age i have witnessed some poor decisions on redevelopment by all levels of government.
Sydney attacks people for all manner of interest as is evidence in its few remaining buildings, the rocks for instance,.

there is a death of commercial buildings, vacant or soon to be as the pandemic as created a work from home situation that had led many businesses to question the need for expensive city based locations for their business.
These properties will flood the market with residential conversions rendering new builds redundant.
When it involves significant pieces of Sydney's history we must take time to consider all the implications and not the dollar.
I would not want this on my conscience.

I am not opposed to development, however, strongly object to the overshadowing of yet another of Sydney's historic sandstone buildings.

I've seen what's happened to other 'sandstones' and deplore the potential loss of curtilege surrounding yet another part of Sydney's heritage.

Government should be preserving, not destroying, important historic treasures, including the buildings themselves and the surrounding streetscape.

I oppose this project as it will destroy the heritage value of the building. The building should be retained in its present form & converted into a boutique hotel.

The project is out of scale and does not respect the existing heritage building of the Secretary's Office.

The proposal for 50 Phillip Street involves turning a gem of one of Sydney's best and treasured public buildings into a hotel with a tower bulging over and through its roof. Prior to selling off a 99 year lease it was the fabulous Lands Department (designed by Colonial Architect James Barnet) and Education Department (by Government Architect George McRae).
The latest proposals, by MAKE architects, with Graham Brooks as "supposedly" heritage consultant, show an ugly three-storey glass protuberance sprouting from the top of the Education Department, before rising up in its offset form
This is the last of the Bridge Street sandstones. The building by the brilliant James Barnet (with mansard and dome by Walter Liberty Vernon), spared no expense. Continuous with the Department of Public Works, it wraps from Macquarie to Bridge and Phillip Streets, richly decorated with ornate columns and arches, wrought iron grilles, marble floors and intricate sandstone carvings in the high Victorian manner. Grand columned-and-pedimented entrances variously welcome all. These buildings recall an era when civic pride was a real thing. When public works strove not to siphon public amenity into private coffers but to enrich the street.
Built’s proposed 48-storey hotel neither replicates nor respects this lost spirit. Instead it commands the old buildings as foyer space then swells out above them like a great slug rampant. Repurposing buildings of our heritage is OK but this proposal shows profound disrespect to the original

I consider this unsolicited proposal should be rejected because:
-it pretends to retain the heritage components of the important 50 Phillip Street but will in reality obliterate its unique character and streetscape prescence under a 47 storey modern tower.
-it is a gross overdevelopment on an already extremely busy intersection at Bridge and Macquarie Street.
-the scale of the proposed tower opposite the entrance to the Botanic Gardens and the Conservatorium of Music is inappropriate
-there is no need for a large hotel at this location. The area is already well supplied with hotel accommodation ie the Intercontinental Hotel immediately opposite the site, the Sir Stamford hotel in Macquarie Street and the proposed boutique hotel redevelopment of the sandstone buildings in Bridge Street.
-it is completely inappropriate and against the public interest to further alienate publicly owned land and buildings , particularly heritage listed buildings such as 50 Phillip Street to private interests by means of the grant of a 99 year lease.
-in addition there is nothing unique, novel or of State significance in this proposal to warrant the consideration of an unsolicited proposal, let alone the acceptance of such a proposal. What is unique or novel about a hotel? The precedent set by progressing this unsolicited bid is extremely troubling and against the public interest- it suggests that any private developer can seek to obtain public lands for such common developments as a hotel! What could be next an office tower, residential apartments or a car park?

The project must be rejected. The proposed building is far too big and will ruin the Chief Secretary's building which is a priceless architectural and historical feature of the city. This point cannot be emphasised enough: this proposal will ruin one of Sydney's most wonderful buildings.

Furthermore, the proposed building is ugly and will block sky and light - two things which are critical to a liveable city - from the surrounding streets.

It's time to stop Sydney being destroyed from the constant construction of huge, ugly and dominating buildings built solely to maximise profit for developers and business people. It's time to start thinking of the residents and workers of our city and stop ruining our home.

The proposal must be rejected for these reasons.

I strenuously object to the design of the proposed new building next to the heritage building at 50 Phillip Street. As a designer I feel that it dwarfs and overpowers and has no homage to the classic building currently there. I am someone that supports new architecture and design but this is a VERY UGLY DESIGN and does not enhance the existing building in any way. The scale of the proposed new building is totally wrong.. the sweeping curve at the bottom leading to the overwhelmingly tall structure is without redeeming features... wrong, wrong, wrong. The original building on 50 Phllip Street is beautifully elegant and aesthetic, the architect of the new building has designed something that will stick out like a sore thumb and will also "date" very quickly... the scale and shape are just awful and has not merit whatsoever. Please do not give this new structure the go ahead.

The proposed design will compromise the Chief Secretary's Building, and its southern wing (50 Phillip Street) and the public square, First Government House Place.
The advocacy arguments are spurious, as there are numerous hotels in this vicinity, the heritage precinct exists successfully as is, and there is plentiful public activity in this vicinity.
Howard Tanner AM LFRAIA

Please find attached EES response

I urge the government to reject this proposal. It would obliterate the heritage value of the existing sandstone building. Too often this government has cowed to property developers - at the expense of public amenity and an agreeable city. In the spirit of Churchill, reflect on the way buildings reflect our values as a community. Nobody walks through the suburbs cluttered with Meriton towers (North Sydney, Bondi Junction, Zetland, Waterloo)? Why? Because they are, impossibly, conspicuously ugly and offensively dull. Moreover, they are a failure of public policy. I urge you not to repeat these mistakes. No other city of Sydney’s repute would permit such an excrescence in its historic district. Sydney’s demented skyline is a testament to the frenzy of development that has marred our city. Please reject this development.