Perth Voice Interactive

STIRLING council’s attempts to block the demolition of a 1923 house on Third Avenue has been smacked down by the state administrative tribunal.

The house is in a “heritage protection area” and places older than the 1960s are supposed to be retained, but following SAT orders to reconsider it the council has now run up the white flag and approved the demolition application by owner Darren Cooper.

Mr Cooper’s consultant Heritage Intelligence pegged the age of the building as around 60 years, but the council’s own consultant found its original construction was in 1923 and the 50s-look was simply alterations.

The consultant’s report argued the place “has no cultural heritage significance to the City of Stirling”, the 70s aesthetic dominates and the old-timey appeal is long lost.

The report also argued Third Ave’s streetscape isn’t intact, as there’s a big two-storey place next door and elsewhere there’s car parks and school playing fields blotting the landscape.

Fear of a costly and drawn out appeal is palpable in the report staff prepared for councillors: They note that if council denies the demolition “it is likely that the city will be required to defend the decision at a full SAT hearing. The city will also be required to engage legal representation if the matter proceeds to a full hearing… the total costs will likely be in excess of $20,000.”

With that potential expense waiting in the wings the council gave it the go ahead to bring in the bulldozers, not even raising it for discussion at Tuesday’s meeting last week.

by DAVID BELL

STIRLING council is moving to tighten up heritage protection in Mount Lawley, Menora and Inglewood.

A review of the suburbs’ “character retention guidelines” and the city’s planning scheme found a loophole that could allow the demolition of old homes the city is trying to protect.

If an applicant could show a streetscape was no longer intact, they could successfully apply for a demolition, even if the house was in immaculate condition.

The council recently advertised its plans to amend the planning scheme to close the loophole, and found ratepayers had mixed feelings, with 58 per cent objecting, 37 per cent supporting and another 4 per cent having a useful suggestion.

Additional costs

Those in support didn’t have much to say, other than to ask for trees to be protected and for 1960s and 70s houses to be included for protection (no luck there).

But objectors threw all they had at the council, coming up with 25 reasons the amendment should be scrapped.

Mainly they complained there was already enough protection in place and any further curbs would limit people’s ability to develop and improve the area. But they were also upset about additional costs and delays, as the council wants all applicants to submit a demolition application before it will even consider what sort of building will go up instead.

The council says the delays and extra costs will be minor and are worth it because of the extra protection for streetscapes.

One punter had a go at the ubiquitous California bungalow, saying the style wasn’t worth preserving, particularly because it was poorly designed and environmentally unfriendly.

STIRLING council says it’s seen off the scourge of multiple dwellings across most of the city.

Back in 2012 there was a clamour over a stuff-up by the WA Planning Commission that opened the floodgates for suburban homes to be demolished and multiple units stacked on the block.

Councils scrambled to come up with new planning rules to stymie developers who’d cottoned on to the WAPC’s error, and to appease ratepayers furious at the increased traffic and reduced amenity in their streets.

Stirling launched an amendment to its local planning scheme to prohibit multiple dwellings in areas zoned R40 or less, with former planning minister John Day adding an exemption to lots that were close to railway stations and other “activity centres”.

Decline

The council now says that since tightening up the rules, it’s “seen a significant decline in the number of development applications for multiple dwellings submitted on R40 coded sites outside of an 800m radius of Activity Centres and railway stations.

“This indicates that Amendment No.32 has been successful in restricting multiple dwelling developments to areas where the need for car based travel is reduced due to the proximity of activity centres and train stations.”

With that success under its belt, the council is now moving to further tighten the rules by increasing the amount of on-site parking needed for multiple dwellings.

It acknowledges that might affect housing affordability.

ST PAUL’S primary school in Mount Lawley has been introducing its students to the world of robotics and coding.

During first term this year, the students used webpages such as code.org and Scratch to catch up with technological advances, which led to an after-school coding club for year 3,4,5 or 6 students who wanted to further their knowledge.

“Robots are going to be important in our future,” says year 6 student Caitlin.

“More and more jobs are going to involve them.”

The school bought a Lego Mindstorm EV3 robot so the students could compete in this year’s Scitech RoboCup.

Teamwork

The kids had to build and program their robots as well as make costumes and props, and choreograph a dance.

The cup aimed to teach children the importance of teamwork and problem solving.

“I am really pleased we got to do RoboCup. I liked having to create a story and dance and program the robots,” Caitlin says.

Year 6 students at the school will later this year get build and programme Arduino coding and electronics kits with engineers at the CSIRO.

Thomas Braunl from UWA’s robotics and automation lab says St Paul’s is on the right track, but more Australian schools – particularly high schools – need to do more to promote robotics, computing and electronics.

“If they see something moving and learn something interesting, they might get an interest in studying it,” Prof Braunl said.

He says while there have been some amazing advances in robotics, predictions of a mass take-over of people’s jobs were a bit over-the-top.

“This has been said for 20 years, and is not happening at any tremendous rate.”

Prof Braunl says while some factory jobs had gone to robots, it had led to the creation of other “high-end” jobs such as programmers and engineers.

“Spending eight hours a day spray painting isn’t really that good a job.”

by KORO BROWN and STEVE GRANT

IT appears the Barnett government has backed down from closing the state library shop.

The Voice had been told by a source within the library board last year that the shop was definitely closing (“Shh, no talking about the cuts,” February 28,2015) and Fremantle author John Dowson was told a month ago to pick up his old stock because the library was closing.

Shared space

However, acting CEO of the library, Mark Woodcock now says the shop is still open and not closing any time soon.

With plans for a new $428 million museum next door having been unveiled and construction to start soon, the library and museum will now share the space for their respective shops until further notice.

The museum is expected to reopen in 2020.

Mr Dowson says the decision to keep the shop open for now was encouraging, but he still has concerns for its long-term future.

Board discussions last year about closing the library one day a week to plug a budget blow-out have not led to action, with Mr Woodcock saying there’s “no current intention to change” library hours.

“Opening hours for the State Library are reviewed from time to time,” Mr Woodcock said.

by MEAGAN BARRETT