' I OBJECT TO THE POWERHOUSE PARRAMATTA' ....

Why move a museum that is already functional in Sydney.

Do not destroy an historical building - Willow grove and St Georges Terraces.Too many of our beautiful old buildings are disappearing. Become a government that NSW can look back on and say - 'what a great Government ' they did not make mindless decisions and waste the tax payers money.

Tourists who visit Sydney - stay in the city - they are not going to get on a train to come and visit a Museum in Parramatta. All the tourist attractions are in Sydney - leave them there..

Listen to the people, 95% of the people think money is being wasted relocating the Powerhouse Museum. Build a Swimming pool and leisure centre for Parramatta.

NSW is not in a great place financially due the COVID 19, do not waste money on projects the people do not need. If this government wants to stay in power, they need to listen to the people who vote and can give them another term.

Myself - I like to visit the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney, as a family we make a day of it, Spend time in Darling Harbour and visit the Powerhouse and the Maritime museums. I have no interest in travelling to Parramatta, I live in Penrith - we get on a train and into the city.

Let the Voters decide, listen to the people of NSW.

I OBJECT TO THE POWERHOUSE PARRAMATTA PROJECT
For the following reasons:
1. The Heritage value of Willowgrove and St Georges’ Terraces is immense and thus the buildings are irreplaceable.
They are rare examples of architecture that no longer exists in the Parramatta CBD. It will result in the loss of sense of place and character of Parramatta.
2. It is not the Museum that Parramatta should have, and not the one promised. It looks as if it will be a flexible commercial events space with a residential floor.
14,000 people signed a petition in just under one week calling on the Premier to protect Willowgrove and St Georges’ Terraces; along with the National Trust of
Australia (NSW) and the Historic House Association.
3. A clear lack of any consultation with western Sydney communities about what cultural precinct and museum was suitable or wanted.
For half the estimated $1.5 Billion costs, Parramatta could have a purpose built museum relating to the cultural aspects of Western Sydney.
4. In 2017 Parramatta City Council developed a cultural plan which was the result of extensive consultation with the local community. It identified very clear
objectives which have been ignored. The current proposal is therefore inappropriate and needs to be urgently reviewed and preferably cancelled.
Save the existing Ultimo Museum in its entirety as there are enough artifacts stored at the Museum’s Castle Hill Storage site to create several museums and therefore an excellent museum at a more appropriate site in Parramatta which should include the saved Willow Grove house and St Georges Terraces as part of a historical precinct.

I object to the Powerhouse Parramatta project in the strongest possible terms for both personal and professional reasons. I am not an Aboriginal man but I am a Parramatta man. I was born in 1947 in 'Willow Grove' when it was the Aloha Maternity Hospital. My late father was a pharmacist in Parramatta for more than 40 years. I spent the first 28 years of my life living in Hunter Street, in the heart of Parramatta and I have maintained a strong connection to the city all my life. It is my country and its cultural heritage must be respected and conserved for all those who, like me, love Parramatta and wish to see its sense of place retained, not destroyed for a totally ill-conceived, invalid and misguided project.

In my youth and in my adult professional life, I have witnessed the destruction of much of Parramatta’s built and cultural landscape heritage, including the alienation of large parts of the former Governor’s Domain for sectional interests and the demolition or degradation of much of the city’s colonial heritage, often for ill-planned and very mediocre new development.

I started my museum career in the Botany Department of the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences and have postgraduate qualifications in Museum Studies. I went on to become Specialist (Environment & Landscape), Heritage & Conservation Branch, NSW Department of Environment and Planning, then Manager (Policy and Research), Tourism Commission of NSW, Assistant Director (Community Relations), Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney, and finally, Acting Director, The Earth Exchange (formerly the Geological and Mining Museum) before going into private practice as a heritage practitioner. I have multi-faceted experience in a wide range of museum and heritage-related areas. My professional practice has been involved in many museum and interpretive projects including award-winning exhibitions, displays and publications relating to places of State heritage significance in New South Wales. I place great value on museum collections and on professional curatorship and well-planned and realised exhibitions and displays that can entertain and educate museum visitors and enrich their lives. It is my understanding that many former staff, including previous members of the senior management team of The Powerhouse and many highly regarded museum and architecture professionals here and overseas are similarly opposed to Powerhouse Parramatta and the threats the proposed relocation would pose to the collection and its professional curatorship and research potential.

The proposed Powerhouse Parramatta will be just a shadow of the present museum in Ultimo, with much less useful display area and too many spaces and facilities not directly related to the serious curatorship and collection research for which the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences has been renowned for well over a century. New South Wales and Parramatta don't need 'Powerhouse Lite' or 'Carriageworks West'. They need The Powerhouse to stay where it is and to receive the Government support it so richly deserves.

A number of major museums overseas have established annexes or satellite museums in other centres, but not at the expense of their much-loved parent institutions. London’s Victoria and Albert Museum has an international design centre annexe in Dundee, Scotland. The Louvre in Paris has a branch at Lens in the Nord-Pas de Calais Region of France and a major satellite museum in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi. The latter museum includes material from thirteen French public cultural institutions. New York’s famous Guggenheim Museum, designed by architect Frank Lloyd Wright, has its satellite museum, designed by architect Frank Gehry, at Bilbao, in the Basque Region of Spain. London's Tate Museum moved its modern art to Tate Modern in a former power station across the Thames but still in central London, not to somewhere like Heathrow, which would be an equivalent distance from London as Paramatta is from Sydney CBD. They didn't abandon their historic Tate Britain at Millbank near St Paul's Cathedral.

By all means, establish a world-class cultural institution at Parramatta, possibly drawing on the vast and under-displayed collections of The Powerhouse, the Australian Museum, the Art Gallery of NSW and other institutions but don’t move The Powerhouse from its Sulman architectural award-winning building in Ultimo where it is a vital part of the State capital’s cultural hub. Better still, why not give Parramatta and Sydney’s Western Suburbs a museum devoted to their own rich culture, their proud Aboriginal heritage, their European colonial past and their present multicultural life. There are many redundant Government-owned buildings in the Parramatta North Historic Sites precinct which should be adapted for sympathetic new purposes, including museum uses.

In the aftermath of the recent disastrous bushfires which burned an area of NSW the size of Wales, many regional communities are struggling, with a devastated tourism industry, and some people who lost their homes are still living in tents, cars and caravans. With the economically crippling addition of the COVID-19 pandemic, a natural disaster of unknown duration, I believe it would not only be financially irresponsible but also immoral for the NSW Government to spend an enormous sum from what will be greatly reduced public funds on a project which many in the community believe is driven by the Government's wish to sell off much of the present Powerhouse site for its development potential. Other, equally valid reasons for not moving the Powerhouse are the flood-prone site, requiring extra expenditure to reduce the flood risk, and the undeniably huge costs and risks of moving the museum's internationally significant collection, especially the Boulton and Watt steam engine, Locomotive No.1 and rolling stock and the Catalina flying boat. The impacts of the Powerhouse Parramatta project on Parramatta's sense of place and on the social significance of the proposed site have also not been adequately addressed in the Environmental Impact Statement.

I demand the NSW Government save 'Willow Grove' and 'St Georges Terrace' and have the political courage to admit that the relocation of the Powerhouse to Parramatta is a giant mistake which can no longer be justified on any grounds. The project must be removed immediately from the Government's development program which instead should be focussed on helping those fire, drought and COVID-19 affected communities most in need rather than on trashing a much-loved Sydney institution.

Chris Betteridge BSc (Sydney), MSc (Museum Studies) (Leicester), AMA (London), M.ICOMOS

Please don't waste at least one billion dollars on this project. Parramatta doesn't need it. Travel to Parramatta from other parts of Sydney is much more complicated than travel to Central, location of the current Powerhouse, and will deter people from visiting it.

I do not agree with this proposal. The Powerhouse Museum is a Sydney icon and should be left where it is. There are plenty of other programs we could use the money on. On top of that, the proposed site has a lot going for it and we do not want an out-of-place new building in this area. I do not believe tourists will come to Parramatta to see the Powerhouse. If left where it is in that wonderful historical area, it will attract more local and overseas visitors. There is too much destruction of the past for too little gain. Please leave the Powerhouse Museum where it is.

The project to build a new museum at Parramatta is not adequately defined. The project documents describe it as a new museum and the EIS has adequately described the impact of the new museum on the site. If it truely were a new museum it would be commendable and highly desirable. Similarly if it were a doubling of space of the existing Powerhouse museum.
However the project has been developed as an alternative to the existing museum at Ultimo, and that it is proposed to move the museum contents to this new building, the EIS should have described the whole project. An objective of the EIS process should be to prevent impact creep. By just looking at each part as a small separate piece and ignoring the project as a whole is an invitation for impact creep.

The EIS needs to address the impact on :-

1) The objects collected
2) The existing museum structure

The last time I visited the museum I visited the adjacent store house. It is filled with seemingly endless rows of storage full of objects that may never have the opportunity to go on display. I was advised that this store house was not the only, or indeed the largest such store house. The store rooms are filled with a huge collection of OUR heritage. What is going to happen to it?

The new building at Parramatta will have a similar floor area as the existing Powerhouse Museum. If it were to be used as a doubling of the museum space it would be a valuable addition to Sydney's museums. But that is not the proposal. The proposal is to move all the exhibits to Parramatta. The museum is crying out for a huge increase in exhibition area so that more of the collection can be exhibited. But instead the exhibited collection is to be moved, meaning that the present status of inadequate space is preserved.

I also happened to look at an object of significance to myself (https://collection.maas.museum/object/242625#&gid=1&pid=9). It was sitting in a glass cabinet, with no indication as to what it was or how it works. It looks like a rather weird work of art, and as such not of much value. But is is actually a working model of the largest and most sophisticated purely mechanical computing machines ever built. My grandparents lugged it (or one like it) around the world as a sales prop 90 years ago. It demonstrates how the machines worked in intricate detail. Yet sitting there no one would ever know. The technology is so sophisticated it would need a floor of a museum to explain how it works and yet in it's current form no one can ever see it working.

Is the ultimate purpose to say - "well we can never exhibit all this stuff. No no cares - so lets get rid of it"? If that is a possible outcome it needs to be addressed in the EIS. The collection is currently languishing for lack of display space and willpower to actually explain the objects. Moving it all to Parramatta into a space of similar size will not address this problem and more likely make it worse.

There is no mention in the EIS about storage. What happens to the storage area? It covers half the Ultimo site. Is all that material to be moved somewhere else? If so where? That is all part of the project too and should be addressed in the EIS.

The EIS also needs to address the practicality of moving the existing exhibits. Many were installed when there was a railway into the site. That has gone, so can they be moved? At what cost? Why move them at all?

The EIS needs to address the feasibility and cost of moving the existing collection the risk of damage and th risk of loss.

The EIS also needs to address the impact on the existing building. The building is in itself of great heritage value. The use of it as a museum compliments this heritage. What will happen to the building when the objects are taken away? Is the site to be sold? Will the building be demolished? Or turned into a hotel? Sydney has enough old buildings that have been gutted and just the facade kept. The impact of the move it likely to result in the destruction of the building as it currently exists. This impact needs to be addressed in the EIS.

The project will cost a huge amount of money. There is an opportunity for it to be a doubling of the Powerhouse Museum. That would be of value (i.e. we would end up with twice the museum). But as a replacement for the existing museum, it has no value (i.e. we would still have a museum of the same size). You just spend a huge aount of money and end up with the same as we already have. Why do that? It would be sheer madness.

I wish to make a submission re planned demolition of Willowgrove Villa and ST Georges Terraces. I do voluntary work at Old Government House Parramatta and I am impressed with all the energy and effort that has gone into restoreing this beautiful old building.
Overall cumulative impact of further heritage destruction in Parramatta currently being undertaken,make Willowgrove and St Georges Terraces vital to retain for the communities sense of place.

My strong objection to the proposed development is based primarily on the required destruction of Willow Grove and St Georges Terrace in Phillip Street . These buildings are highly significant to Parramatta and must be retained. They are the last remaining Victorian Italianate free standing villa and Victorian Terraces in the Parramatta CBD. True treasures!
As a child I was always fascinated by Willow Grove - the beauty of the building and the glorious garden setting set against the bustling 20 th century city landscape was always refreshing. This contrast has only increased as the development of Parramatta increased.
Willow Grove also holds a special place in the hearts of many of my friends who's family members were born there when it operated as a maternity hospital up until the 1950's.
I found it quite upsetting that the heritage impact statement stated that removal of Willow Grove and St George's Terrace will only have minor cumulative impact. This is quite incorrect as these are the last remaining buildings of their type in the CBD and vital to retain for communities' sense of place. We as a community have distressingly lost too many heritage sites in the city.
No plaques or "interpretive" inclusions can substitute for the destruction of these important buildings.
There does not appear to have been any attempt to try and integrate the heritage buildings into the design. In fact the design also appears to negate the plan by City of Parramatta to eventually create a Civic Link to the river as the new building effectively blocks open access and funnels pedestrians into a narrow tunnel .
Although I am happy to see investment by the Government into a museum in Parramatta I am disappointed that the current proposal is unsuitable for the site and does not respect the heritage of the city or the significance of the location.

Willow Grove can be a building that could be contrasted with what is built today. People will say 'wow' look how far our building prowess has progressed in just 100yrs... If Willow Grove or any remaining heritage buildings in Parramatta or anywhere in Australia really are knocked down people will not realise the enormity of our modern progress!! Just looking at pictures in books is not any experience. The old sandstone law courts in the St James precinct is a good example. Walking in the passages of these old buildings you get a sense of how small our ancestors were. The passage ways are narrow and the ceilings low, quite closed in and claustrophobic. You get a real sense of history, our history, and then look at the modern law courts on the next block all glass and steel and huge. You can actually feel the history and wonder at our past and future. Compare and contrast reality... Please leave our wonderful old buildings be or at the very least incorporate them into the wonders of future builds.

I am very supportive of Parramatta having a branch of the MAAS. I also support the chosen site and the scheme selected from the competition entries. I do not support the closure and downsizing of the Ultimo MAAS. That museum should be retained, and upgraded also so that MAAS has a presence in Eastern and Western Sydney.
In terms of the proposal at Parramatta - I admire the proposed museum's civic presence and ambition. If the Ultimo MAAS is really to be closed - the designers of the Parramatta MAAS should demonstrate how they are going to showcase the permanent collection. Although elegant, the current scheme does appear to be configured to prioritise transitory events and exhibitions, and does not give confidence that the MAAS collection will be the central focus of the building. It risks being a minor element in a bigger cultural facility. Although I have no objection to companion spaces and uses - the presence, exhibition and space for the MAAS collection, should be primary.
There is also an opportunity for the landscaped areas under the building, along the riverfront, to more openly celebrate and respond to the prospect of periodic infiltration of the site by flood. Many sites along the riverbank are flood affected - I have no concerns about this being able to be addressed technically, but think there is greater opportunity to develop a more substantial lyrical, and physical acknowledgement of that dynamic condition.
The building has a very strong presence in Parramatta. I am of the view that this is highly positive. As someone who grew up in Western Sydney, and whose family still lives in the region, it is long overdue that it has access to a leading cultural institution of national importance. However - this scale and sense of ambition come with risks, if not realised well. The design resolution, detailed documentation and construction of the building are critical to ensuring that its ambition is reflected in the reality of its outcome. I urge you to give the Design Jury (particularly architect Wendy Lewin) an active review and sign-off role during all future stages of the building's documentation and construction on site. Corners must not be cut. The jury's continuing oversight would give much-needed support to the architects and designers of the building to develop and deliver their proposal to the highest level possible. Nothing less will do.