Heritage and the New Housing Zones

On Tuesday 26th August, the Heritage Committee of the RHSV and the National Trust of Australia (Victoria) held a pubic meeting, ‘Heritage and the New Housing Zones’. Collette Brennan, National Trust CEO, opened the meeting, reminding the audience that the RHSV and the Trust had issued a joint statement on 9 July, ‘More Housing and Heritage Must Go Hand in Hand’. The meeting then heard from three of the state’s top planners and heritage experts. Subsequently, a number of attendees requested that the slides of their presentations be put on the web. Here they are.

Scott Walker is Director Urban Living, City of Boroondara. He spoke on ’The Heritage Challenge for New Housing near Activity Centres’. Scott has been at the forefront of discussions with the Department of Transport and Planning on the application of the new zones. He showed that the new zones should not apply to sites covered by the Heritage Overlay, which was the main point of our joint statement.

 

Nigel Lewis has been doyen of Melbourne heritage architects since 1976, leader of the first of many urban conservation projects in inner Melbourne. He is talk, entitled ‘Not misunderstanding heritage controls’ recounts his own path to heritage conservation. His slides recount the struggle to establish heritage preservation and the threats posed by the new zones.

 

Michael Buxton is Emeritus Professor at RMIT University and former head of the RMIT Planning and Environment Program, Michael has been active in Charter 29, analysing the issues posed by the new regime (see their web site at https://www.charter29.com/). Michael’s talk was entitled ‘A future without a past: how to avoid demolishing a city to save it’.