Uglies: Black-tie at 715 George

715 George St, corner Regent Rd, Dunedin

█ Clan Construction Commercial Ltd
http://www.companies.govt.nz/co/4013678

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### ODT Online Thu, 10 Dec 2015
Student apartments going up
Construction has begun on six new student apartments at the corner of George St and Regent Rd, Dunedin. The 962sq m triangular-shaped site is owned by Straits International Ltd, and was the site of a service station for about 80 years. The Dunedin City Council has given resource consent for the company to construct four residential units in a two-storey building (block 1) and two residential units in a three-storey building (block 2), thereby creating 22 habitable rooms. Construction is expected to be completed next year.
ODT Link

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Comments at ODT Online:

Student apartments
Submitted by Barnaby on Thu, 10/12/2015 – 6:35pm.

No! This was not a service station site for 80 years. There was a beautiful two-storey substantial brick heritage house on this site until about the 1970s. This is just another step in the incremental loss of North End heritage. This shows very poor planning from DCC, making this part of town, and the main street in this case, an ever expanding precinct of badly designed cheaply built high density housing. These will add to the stock of other similar structures forming “North Dunedin’s slums of the future”. Ratepayers’ will probably end up funding the future purchase of such cheap accomodation to mitigate associated social problems and the appalling visual amenity. Very poor city planning indeed.

Habitable room disasters
Submitted by ej kerr on Fri, 11/12/2015 – 12:43pm.

Prominent George St corner sites are being trashed by the banal. More habitable rooms – No emphasis on good contemporary design, no flair.
This one’s built right to the footpath on the main street, with little modulation and no hint of garden or vertical planting possible, except something to the corner part-screened by the witless bus shelter shoved on its concrete pad.
Given the rich inheritance, where has Dunedin street architecture gone? Where are the design professions? Why so much visual erosion? Where is the NZ Institute of Architects? Why no City Architect Office and independent Urban Design Panel to uphold design values for Dunedin residents and ratepayers?
Ugh! DCC planning fail. DCC urban design fail. DCC district plan fail. When will DCC grow up – to promote sympathetic edgy contemporary architecture and design for major city axials, at the very least. A step up from turning Dunedin into bog city with tawdry gateway approaches.

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6.1.14 George Street: Two new uglies (thanks DCC, no City Architect…)

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

*Image: misted lettered tweaked by whatifdunedin

DCC: i-SITE to relocate to Octagon Civic Centre

Dunedin City Council – Media Release
i-SITE to Relocate to Octagon Civic Centre

This item was published on 28 Apr 2015

Dunedin’s i-SITE Visitor Centre is to move to a higher profile central city location in the Octagon Civic Centre. The move, due to be completed by the end of September, will see i-SITE combine Department of Conservation visitor information services within its current visitor information delivery in a site that can present a seamless service.

Director Enterprise Dunedin John Christie says combining visitor services with DOC meant that it was a perfect time to consider the i-SITE’s location.

“The i-SITE is a key ‘shop front’ for all visitors and residents. Its location is of great importance as it sets a platform for city branding, marketing and delivery. After considering other sites we decided that the Octagon Civic Centre was best suited to cater for Dunedin visitors. The Octagon is an iconic, accessible area for Dunedin city and an obvious place to have our i-SITE. It will help create a sustainable and vibrant city centre by attracting people and providing economic impetus through improved promotion of Dunedin’s many tours and attractions.”

Dunedin i-SITE Manager Louise van de Vlierd says the new location and combining with DOC will help the i-SITE enhance Economic Development Strategy delivery.

“The i-SITE’s activities include providing information on all aspects of Dunedin to visitors influencing the visitor to stay longer and spend more in Dunedin. The new location, with its increased visibility, will help promote options for visitors in a more engaging way. We are very happy that we can achieve the move within current budgets, and expect that this prominent and central location will result in higher revenue for the city”.

Enterprise Dunedin is currently working on design of the new interior and plans to be in the premises by 30 September this year and will be joined by DOC at a later date. The Civic Centre site will provide a floor area of approximately 150m2 compared to 135m2 in the current Princes Street site.

Dunedin City Council Manager City Property Kevin Taylor says the Civic Centre site is a brilliant space and the move fits in well with their plans to make some modest changes to the i-SITE frontage. “It is a timely move and we certainly see them as a great tenant for that space.” Mr Taylor says they have plans for the Princes Street site once it is vacated and they hope to announce those in the not too distant future.

█ The i-SITE New Zealand visitor centres are the official visitor information network. The brand is owned and managed by Tourism New Zealand.

█ Dunedin i-SITE is 50% funded by the DCC with the other 50% being funded from the i-SITE’s revenue generating activities. Currently the i-SITE receives approximately 300,000 visitors each year, 62% of which is foot traffic, and generates $475,000 in revenue. 81% of product sold is for local Dunedin operators. The visitor satisfaction rating for i-SITE services is more than 95%.

Contact John Christie, Director Enterprise Dunedin on 471 8836.
DCC Link

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Wall Street Mall drops glazing panel to George Street

Late afternoon those of us refuelling at a local café in George St heard a sudden crash of glass across the road – broken glass littered the footpath, parking spaces and north-bound lane outside Wall Street Mall.

The mall’s street facade had suddenly dropped a glazing panel, a section of pretend parapet – from the very top of the (graphic) ‘old-building’ screen.
Luckily, no-one was hurt.

Missing glazing panel.

Panels in situ.

Camera phone not coping too well with the late sun angle but you get the idea.

A well-known woman sitting along from me said she’d never liked that glass design anyway.

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Santa Parade, Dunedin (7 Dec 2014)

A People Day —images by Elizabeth Kerr
The flavour of the Santa Parade for those who couldn’t make it to George Street on Sunday. Following the eight sets of images (lowres only for website use, sampled from 540 frames) there is a link to last year’s photographs. The only disappointment yesterday was that Santa wore dark glasses….Big Mistake, and failed to pin his hat on securely for gusty conditions, it flew off at the best place to get photos, sigh.

Here be young and old, Mayor Cull, the ‘future generations’ stuck with paying for your amazing +$20 million per annum loss-making stadium, Christmas! If they can pay for it.

Congratulations to parade organiser Mark Laughton and the Dunedin Santa Parade Trust for another highly enjoyable and successful event.

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Set 1

Set 2

Set 3

Set 4

Set 5

Set 6

Set 7

Set 8

Octagon concert crowd

█ Santa Parade, Dunedin (1 Dec 2013)

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

George Street: Two new uglies (thanks DCC, no City Architect…)

(just DCC resource management planners with no design training, and use of the odd ‘consulting architect’ who lamely fails to press that architectural details be made “right”, lest they upset “the boys”—be they lousy small-time architects (as opposed to REAL DESIGN ARCHITECTS), architectural designers, draftsmen, builders, property developers or investors). Our kindom, for a City Architect —to compile and enforce design guidelines, and through district plan mechanisms, to require the use of registered architects by developers working in important townscape precincts like George Street, and to shove an unforgiving multidisciplinary Urban Design Panel at the buggers.

No. 1 —Apartments, 581 George Street
We’re all familiar with Farry’s Motel, now Farry’s Motel Apartments at 575 George Street. The complex used to look out on a green area, and vehicle parking with mature trees and shrubbery at 581.

DCC Webmap 575-581 George Street

Malcolm Farry recently sold the properties at 575 and 581 to Ethel Limited, a family company led by Frank Cazemier who has worked for Cutlers as a “University Investment Sales Specialist”. A cursory check of directorships at the NZ Companies Office website shows Cazemier is “one of the boys”. Pity he knows next to nothing about contextual commercial residential design, architectural bulk and location, facade modulation, sun angles, or landscape architecture —such that can’t be solved by ready trees.

Farry’s Motel Apartments now looks out on a poorly designed featureless boundary fence, and the sobering double block of apartments ‘next door’ at 581. The block furthest from the street (walls of light blue), when seen from driveways to either side, reveals a ‘long elevation’ running parallel to George Street that resembles a jerry-built, badly-windowed reclad of a tired country hall (the low, horizontally-orientated fenestration allows for another floor of rooms above, in the roofspace).

The marketing statement for Farry’s Motel Apartments at 575 still says:
“Set alongside a large grassed area that provides a playground and picnic spots, we are one of the most centrally located Dunedin motels, offering an absolutely superb main street position.”

This is no longer the case.
The very likely expensive exercise in ‘infill design’ (intensification/ densification…) issued from the drawing board of Bill Henderson, Architect of (fuck-a-daisy)WANAKA —someone who appears to work at the ‘cheap-looking’ end of the market, or at least has diminished design flare, poor knowledge of scale detail and proportion, and lack of expertise in three-dimensional architectural composition. As a result, and while meeting planning criteria for the zone, the motels/apartments at 575 and 581 now look about fit for student stays only, or at a pinch, the G&T parents of capping graduands. No fear, the new apartments will be mouth-wateringly expensive to rent. The student ghetto continues, behind the tacky dress-up to George Street.

Incidently, Farry’s operates a charge back system with the former Farry-owned Cargill’s Hotel, now Quality Hotel Cargills at 686 George Street.

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No. 2 —Apartments, 2 St David Street, cnr George Street
There used to be a nice old single-storey bungalow with fine curving bay windows and a palm tree on this site, next to Quality Hotel Cargills. Only the palm tree remains. The bungalow became victim to an excavator. It isn’t clear if the windows and internal period joinery (if still present) were dismantled for re-use.

The site is now owned by Newmarket Investments Limited and has been recently developed for apartments. The company directors are Clive Hewitson and wife Wendy May Hewitson. Clive Hewitson’s profile at LinkedIn says: “Director – Otago & Southland, New Zealand | Real Estate”. Hewitson is another of the “boys”, as records at the NZ Companies Office show. Some link up in the past with companies of which Frank Cazemier (mentioned above) has also been a director.

The apartment complex is faced, not too convincingly, in ‘red brick’ – at first glance, no-one can tell if it’s real brick facing or veneer! Questionable are the lack of reveals, and the scale and position of openings (doors and windows) in the street elevations; with tweaking to proportions and placements this could have solved. The glazing bars are wrong. Small frosted bathroom and toilet windows to the street (on the public face of your building) are a No-no. The shallowness of the gables to the street elevations, also grates in perspective. The grey wooden pickets added to the base of the original garden fence are odd. The whole is unnecessarily dreary. Taxi drivers hate it. The pencil cypresses may provide a foil, once mature (the building really needs one hell of a lot of ivy). Have to admit, designing anything between Quality Hotel Cargills and Econo Lodge Alcala is a free-for-all, BUT why not try…

No registered architect. It shows. The developer used RJ Oliver Architectural Design, Mosgiel – spot the spelling mistake!

Why didn’t Quality Hotel Cargills buy 2 St David Street to take control of the prominent corner to George Street? We note Dunedin architect Hamish Wixon is a director/shareholder of 678 George Street Limited and Cargills Hotel Limited. Perhaps we can look forward to developments at the tired Cargills…

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Strategic Site: 715 George Street, cnr Regent Road
Can we possibly imagine what will get built on the site of the former BP 2go Regent service station? Another horror story? Another ‘architectual’ (sic) bodice-ripper? 715 is owned by Northfield Property and Investment Company Limited. The sole director is Bryan Howard Usher of Dunedin.

DCC Webmap – 715 George Street (context)

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Post and building images by Elizabeth Kerr

Santa Parade, Dunedin (1 Dec 2013)

Updated post 5.11.14 at 2:26 p.m.

Sun, 1 Dec 2013
Perfect weather – the event went ahead as planned. The parade started at 3pm at the former BP service station, corner Regent Rd and George St, and travelled to the Octagon where free live music was provided for the crowd.

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### ODT Online Mon, 2 Dec 2013
Santa parade crowd-pleaser
By Shawn McAvinue
The 78 floats ranged from a jaw-flapping dragon to referee-jumping roller-skaters and a giant albatross that bellowed Cliff Richard’s song Summer Holiday to mark the official start of the festive season. Dunedin Santa Parade Trust chairman Dean Driver said the parade was ”sensational”.
Read more + Slideshow* [Captions with names of festival participants]

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Post and images by Elizabeth Kerr

Stadium: ideas for real photos

Images: ©2012 Elizabeth Kerr