Councillors who blog

I've come across two City of Sydney councillors who blog: Shayne Mallard and Chris Harris.

Shayne deserves kudos for being the first politian I've come across to actually allow comments on their blog. But mate, please try to keep those posts short and open! Maybe then you'll get a few more comments ;-)

Chris's blog is quite dry and "party line", which is a shame because he actually seems like a really nice guy. I was in a frantic rush a few months ago when he was working his way down our street door knocking. I thought he was trying to sell encyclopedias or something and brushed him off, but he stayed charming — not phased by it all.

Chinese Garden Of Friendship

At best we were expecting a quiet but expensive place to eat our sandwiches. But the Chinese Garden of Friendship at Darling Harbour is much more.

Welcome to a tiny universe of waterfalls, bridges, pavilions and brooks structured around a lake full of giant goldfish. All very auspicious — and a great place to set the ankle-biters loose for an hour.

It's also very easy to get too from Chippendale. We just strolled through Ultimo TAFE and then took the footbridge that starts at the PowerHouse Museum.

The latest on the CUB site

This report by the Coalition of Chippendale Community Groups about their meeting with Frank Sartor is certainly worth a read.

It seems like some of the ice has thawed which is a relief, but you've got to wonder how we got this point in the first place. I guess everyone has so much to win and loose (money for developers, amenity for residents, density for government) that communication was always going to be a challenge.

Tucked near the end of their report is mention of retaining the Kensington Street terraces and of creating an off-road pedestrian and cycle route through Chippendale to the city.

On the former issue, I've often thought that if you pedestrianised Kensington Street, refurbished the terraces and decorated them thematically (fairy lights, etc), it could become an gorgeous dining district, which certainly would increase the value of the apartments being built nearby. (Think Lygon St, Melbourne.)

On the latter issue, bring it on! But I doubt I'll get to the community meeting where they're promising to discuss it, so I encourage you to also communicate details of this plan through the internet. There are fantastic mapping tools out there, and it takes about 2 minutes to start a free blog through Blogger.

It's all too big

Usually, Life in Chippendale plods on at a manageable pace. Not too much happens in our little world, and much of what does happen gets written about here — with very strong words.

But the last two months have been crazy for our dear suburb. I can't count the number of times the CUB site been discussed in the newspapers and debated in council meetings. And Life In Chippendale has been almost silent.

Why? Because it's all too big. I'd rather write "here's what I believe" than write "I just don't know". And when it comes to CUB, there's a lot I don't know.

Nonetheless, let's start with what I do know:

• The CUB development will define Chippendale — we have to get it right


• Developers, councellors, community groups and politicians of every hue all have a mixed record (sometimes right, sometimes wrong) on major projects such as these


• Chippendale needs more open space and a library, and the CUB site is the obvious place to put them


• Public transport is better in Chippendale than in almost all of the rest of Sydney, but it can and should get much, much better to support high density residential developments like the one planned for CUB


• To my non-expert eye, many of the buildings on the site are attractive and merit retention, while some are just plain ugly


• Everyone is blaming everyone else for how long this is dragging on

And here's what I don't know:

• Whether the City of Sydney and Fosters really were on the brink of reaching an agreement when Frank Sartor "called in" the site under his newish powers as the Minister for Planning


• Whether the incredible length of the negotiations between the City of Sydney and Fosters were caused by unreasonable behaviour by either party or simply by the complexity of the issues


• Which if any of the concessions negotiated by the City of Sydney will be sacrificed under the new arrangements

I'll be watching the situation closely, but it'll probably be quite a while until I have the confidence to express a strong opinion about the CUB site. Let's hope that by the time most of us have worked out what's going on there, it's not too late to influence the outcome.