Councillor Chris Harris

On the day that Justice Jayne Jagot found for the developer in the Carlton United Breweries (CUB) case she highlighted the fact that courts do not make merit decisions, they simply uphold the law.  Whether or not that law is a donkey’s bottom is irrelevant, it’s the law.

For all of those who had believed there was a chance for the environment and for Sydney to come out of its industrial revolution, smog-infested thinking, it was a very bleak day indeed.

Then from the gloom of the courtroom there was suddenly hope in a Chippendale café coming from the most unexpected source – the developer.

Unlike Foster’s - the previous owners of the CUB site who wouldn’t even return phone calls let alone agree to a meeting - the Singapore based Frasers Group wanted to talk.

Ecological sustainability of the CUB site is the fundamental core of the community’s problem with the development. This community is as Elizabeth Farrelly articulated in her piece (Fooled again by a system that stinks SMH 22/8/07) “neither stupid nor intransigent nor luddite; they know that development must happen and that sustainability demands density.”

However the concept plan as approved by Minister Sartor delivers a development that is not so much dense as impenetrable  – 120 metre towers, 2800 residents, 4800 workers, 2300 cars – and that it will more than double the population of Chippendale appears lost on the Minister. In fact the density of the development is such that the public space so fiercely fought for will be compromised by overshadowing and up to 600 apartments could be without sunlight for most of the day.

With no requirement to harvest its own water, recycle its own sewage or provide its own power the CUB site will be responsible for 0.45 per cent of the entire City of Sydney CO2 greenhouse gas emissions.

These were the facts that Deputy Lord Mayor of Sydney Greens Cr. Chris Harris, Michael Mobbs, renowned sustainability coach, Matthew Drake-Brockman, litigant in the CUB case and Lindsay Charles, Chippendale representative, put to Frasers.

What they offered Frasers was the opportunity to build a landmark sustainable development. A development that was economically viable (sustainable infrastructure achieves 20 to 30 per cent savings on unsustainable development); that would harvest and recycle its water; that was powered by renewable not coal-fired electricity; that eliminated cars yet satisfied car drivers by providing car-share car spaces and that didn’t pump sewage from the 7600 people living and working on the site into the ocean. At the moment when there is a storm the sewage system spills over 30 million litres of raw sewage into Blackwattle Bay every year. Imagine how much the CUB site would add to this?

While not immediately leaping at the opportunity to create such a totally sustainable icon in Sydney, Frasers did agree to a second meeting on September 6, this time with Professor Michael Archer, Dean of Science University of NSW and convened by Deputy Lord Mayor Greens Cr. Harris.

Professor Archer is an acclaimed palaeontologist whose experience in analysing and evaluating the effects of climate fluctuations on the planet through the millennia, affords him the expertise to predict what might happen if we do not correct our CO2 emissions.

It is hoped that Professor Archer’s scientific solutions coupled with the sustainable suggestions made by Cr. Chris Harris and Michael Mobbs will convince Frasers of the importance of building a sustainable development that reduces the city’s CO2 emissions and enhances rather than detracts from the public amenity.

The question is not whether Frasers is listening but whether they are prepared to sacrifice their unsustainable concept plan and instead build a sustainable future for Sydney.