Property giant Bloomberg Inc fights $2.1b redevelopment of Brisbane’s Eagle Street Pier
Two property heavyweights are at war over an ambitious $2 billion scheme to utterly transform a key slice of the Brisbane’s CBD.
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CLASH OF THE TITANS
Two heavyweights in the property game are at war over an ambitious scheme to utterly transform a key slice of the Brisbane CBD.
At stake is the fate of a $2.1 billion redevelopment of the Eagle Street Pier and Waterfront Place proposed by the owner, real estate giant Dexus.
Bloomberg Incorporation Ltd, which owns the mixed-use Riparian Plaza tower at 71 Eagle St, lodged an objection to the Dexus development application with the Brisbane City Council this month.
Riparian, which includes apartments owned by some of the city’s wealthiest residents, is the only property adjoining or in the vicinity of the redevelopment site not controlled by Dexus, which hopes to erect two new skyscrapers as part of its “Waterfront Brisbane’’ masterplan.
In a detailed submission, Bloomberg boss Scott Collins attacked the project as “an overdevelopment of the site (that) constitutes a patent attempt to maximise yield in circumvention of Brisbane’s planning scheme’’.
He warns of a “Sydney-centric vision’’ at odds with the city’s subtropical character and says it could lead to “a river wall of considerable bulk and scale with little contextual relationship to their neighbouring properties or responsiveness with the city grid’’.
Collins also flags concerns with the reflected glare and heat of the western sun, which he says is a product of building orientation that could “severely and adversely’’ impact both Riparian Plaza and other parts of the CBD.
While Collins stresses that Bloomberg is not opposed to redevelopment of the area per se, he is worried that the BCC has deemed the project “code assessable’’.
That means it already complies with local planning laws. While the public and other stakeholders can make submissions, they have no formal right of appeal and the council can only refuse the DA if there are code violations or unfixable engineering hurdles.
Collins did not return a call on Wednesday, while a Dexus spin doctor declined to comment.
Dexus, the nation’s biggest office landlord, first flagged plans for the redevelopment in early 2018. Last December it signed a “facilitation agreement’’ with the state government, which has embraced the project as a “city-shaping” initiative.
Under a staged plan set to roll out over more than six years, Dexus would build two mixed-use towers with 43 and 49 floors, as well dining outlets, retail space, public plazas and an enhanced Riverwalk for pedestrians and cyclists.
It’s one of several projects in the Dexus pipeline, valued over $11 billion.
But will Australia need all that office space now that plenty of people plan to continue working from home? We’ll see.
FALLING SHORT
It’s not just Bloomberg, the owner of Riparian Plaza, which is less than thrilled with the $2.1 billion scheme to remake Eagle Street Pier and Waterfront Place.
A Brisbane CBD bicycle users group has also lodged a submission with the city council taking aim at one particular part of the sprawling Dexus redevelopment plan.
Specifically, they are pretty unhappy with the Riverwalk element of the scheme.
Don Campbell, who helps run the delightfully-named CBD BUG, says that it “falls a long way short of providing a world-class facility that is free from conflict, caters for everyone and is designed to meet the needs of active transport growth’’.
He notes that the group attended consultation meetings with Dexus to provide them with input.
“It is disappointing to see that the architect has ignored this and has chosen to repeat the substandard facilities of the past,’’ Campbell writes.
The group maintains that the 6m-wide Riverwalk is not expansive enough for the estimated 1400 cyclists and 7600 pedestrians who use it every day.
HUMAN ERROR
One of Queensland’s leading tech services firms has upped stumps and relocated to a bigger and better headquarters.
Data#3, headed by Laurence Baynham, announced this week that it was relocating from its longtime base on the Toowong high street to nearby 555 Coronation Drive, coincidentally a former home of the then-named Crime and Misconduct Commission.
Despite all that you-beaut technology, though, a very human error crept in to the proceedings.
In a statement to the ASX, chief financial officer Bremner Hill erroneously said the company was shifting to 255 Coronation Drive. Whoops!
That note was quickly followed up with a correction, which included a reassurance that existing phone and fax numbers would remain unchanged. Wait…what? Fax machines? Does anybody still use those?
Anyway, despite that nod to the 80s, the new fit-out will come with all the AI bells and whistles you might expect, including plenty of wireless gizmos and voice-activated thingies.
The move comes just a week after Data#3 reported a 30 per cent spike in net profit to a record $23.6m. Revenue climbed nearly 15 per cent to $1.6 billion.
ONGOING DISPUTE
It’s been a tough week for the Wagner brothers in Toowoomba.
Their self-named building materials group reported a paltry $17,000 net profit for the last financial year, down from a $12.77m result in 2019.
While the pandemic played some part in that dismal performance, a big slice of the blame can be sheeted out to their ongoing pricing dispute with industry giant Boral.
Wagners halted cement deliveries to Boral, its biggest customer, in March last year, taking a $10m hit to the bottom line.
It then took legal action, accusing Boral of trying to lower prices after receiving cheaper offers from another competitor, Cement Australia.
Quixotically, Boral defended the case even as it resumed buying Wagners cement in October.
Boral emerged victorious in June, with the Brisbane Supreme Court ruling that Wagners had to meet those lower prices.
But neither party is entirely happy with the decision and they will spar again in the Court of Appeal on October 22.