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Eveleigh Heritage Update - 22 Oct 2010

This update is to provide a brief Eveleigh heritage update, to make sure that you are aware of the Eveleigh Open Day on 30th October 2010 and to urge your input into the Heritage Interpretation Plan for Former Eveleigh Rail Yards. In this Update: Eveleigh Rail Yards Community Consultation Open Day – Saturday 30 October 2010 / What is the Former Eveleigh Rail Yards Interpretation Plan? / Redfern Waterloo Heritage Task Force (RWHT) / RWHT Heritage Projects / Support the Eveleigh Steering Committee (ESC) / What is happening on the ATP Conservation Management Plan (CMP) / Heritage Installations in ATP Innovation Plaza / Work on Locomotive Workshops Bays 1 & 2 / Update on Other Eveleigh News dealing with Heritage / Conclusion – Make sure you put your ideas forward now!

To: All those with an interest in Heritage & the Former Eveleigh Rail Yards

In this Update:

Eveleigh Rail Yards Community Consultation Open Day – Saturday 30 October 2010

What is the Former Eveleigh Rail Yards Interpretation Plan?

Redfern Waterloo Heritage Task Force (RWHT)

RWHT Heritage Projects

Support the Eveleigh Steering Committee (ESC)

What is happening on the ATP Conservation Management Plan (CMP)

Heritage Installations in ATP Innovation Plaza

Work on Locomotive Workshops Bays 1 & 2

Update on Other Eveleigh News dealing with Heritage

Conclusion – Make sure you put your ideas forward now!

 

Eveleigh Rail Yards Community Consultation Open Day – Saturday 30 October 2010

You are invited to share your passion for this important part of Sydney’s industrial heritage and be part of an exciting opportunity to shape the Eveleigh Rail Yards Interpretation Plan. Come along and tell your story and hear from others.

  • Stories professionally recorded
  • Rail Songs and Films
  • Creative Soundscapes in an old workshop
  • Heritage Artist at Work
  • Lunch provided

Venue: Innovation Plaza, Australian Technology Park, Locomotive St, Eveleigh 10:00 am-3:30 pm 30 October 2010
Contact: RSVP essential to reception@rwa.nsw.gov.au or phone 9202 9100.
You can also download the RWA Eveleigh Interpretation Plan Consultation Invite and pass it on to people who might be interested.

If you are unable to come please put your comments & stories in an email or letter and send it to Juliet Suich, Redfern-Waterloo Heritage Taskforce at juliet.suich@rwa.nsw.gov.au

What is the Former Eveleigh Rail Yards Interpretation Plan?

The Interpretation Plan aims to put in place a framework for the interpretation of the entire former Eveleigh site that can be used over the next 20 years. As the site fragments it is important to have an Interpretation Plan that captures the importance and connectedness of the whole site including the ATP, North Eveleigh, The Large Erecting Shop and other areas currently under Railcorp control.

This is an opportunity to capture many stories and ideas about what should be done to capture and tell the site’s history so it’s not lost for the future.

Following consideration of the project by the Eveleigh Steering Committee and the Redfern Waterloo Heritage Taskforce the RWA has engaged 3D Projects in association with Artscape and Only Human to prepare an Interpretation Plan for the Eveleigh Rail Yards Precinct. The specific aims of the Plan are to:

  • Guide and facilitate interpretation of the site’s heritage significance as a conservation process designed to sustain the site’s authenticity and character;
  • Identify existing audiences and visitor experiences on the Eveleigh site, including workers, neighbours resident in the district, railway tourists and school groups as well as quantify opportunities to enhance visitor numbers and experiences in each of these categories;
  • Achieve enhanced public understanding of the history of the area and its significance to residents, workers and visitors by fostering active links with the community, as well as with tourism, education and recreation activities;
  • Ensure interpretive devices and their content have the potential to engage and provoke public interest, are accessible, sustainable (in relation to maintenance, evaluation and review) reversible (in relation to heritage fabric) and compatible with the sites for which they are chosen.

The consultants have been reading the large number of reports on the site and the October 30th Day provides the opportunity for ex-workers, heritage people and the community to meet the consultants and have input into this interpretation. The Interpretation Plan will be a key aspect of the RWHT report to the Minister for Redfern Waterloo later this year.

Redfern Waterloo Heritage Task Force (RWHT)

The RWHT is to present its report to the Minister for Redfern Waterloo by the end of the year. The RWHT was set up for just one year and the RWA has only provided staff support for this period. What might be possible to follow the initial work of the RWHT and the Eveleigh Steering Committee after it is disbanded needs to be considered. Mr Peter Phillips from ICOMOS joined the RWHT as a non-government heritage specialist as did Dillon Kombumerri and Dave Beaumont as representatives of the Aboriginal community.

The report to the minister should highlight the important role heritage should play in the future of the sites that make up the former railway yards and Redfern Waterloo more broadly. The Eveleigh Interpretation Plan will be a key element in the report. You can find out more about the RWHT at www.redfernwaterloo.nsw.gov.au/community_consultation/heritage.htm.

RWHT Heritage Projects

While there have been a number of Heritage Projects proposed which are being progressed, many of the ideas and aspirations such as Collections Management; Workers Wall; Workers and the Social and Cultural History of the Site have not seen working groups or projects eventuate. Partly this is because of the short timeframe and because of the planning and funding necessary to develop such large projects. This makes it even more important that such areas be captured in the Eveleigh Interpretation Plan.

Due to the short timeframe for the RWHT project applications have now closed. The heritage projects which have being endorsed by the RWHT include:

  • A Railway Heritage Arts Project including a Railway Film Festival being worked on by Brian Dunnett
  • A Book and Website project that aims to make publically available material about Eveleigh from research by Prof Lucy Taksa
  • A study documenting Aboriginal connections with Eveleigh
  • The Dictionary of Sydney to include Redfern and Eveleigh Heritage material in their project
  • Office of Rail Heritage project to locate and return some Eveleigh Heritage items from their collection
  • Restoration of the LES War Memorial
  • A soundscape and possible guided tour project by Performance Space and Nigal Helyer
  • Collaboration with City of Sydney’s Eora Journey which has been involved in Aboriginal Cultural Mapping
  • A D’harawai Aboriginal Seasonal Calendar project at Alexandria Park Community School
  • Heritage Artist Jane Bennet to display of relevant art and heritage painting demonstration on 30 October
  • Project to recommission some heritage equipment proposed by Wrought Artworks 

Support the Eveleigh Steering Committee (ESC)

The ESC is been slow to get underway and has now had four meetings which have looked at Eveleigh heritage issues. As the ESC aims to bring together people with an interest in Eveleigh this committee has the possibility of continuing to meet and discuss how projects concerning Eveleigh might be progressed even if the RWHT is not extended. I would hence encourage people with an interest in Eveleigh to throw their weight behind this committee and to attend it or make suggestions. At the request of its members, the committee is currently chaired by RWA CEO Roy Wakelin-King and Guido Gouverneur has been appointed spokesperson for the group.

What is happening on the ATP Conservation Management Plan (CMP)

The revision of the CMP being done by Godden McKay Logan is almost ready for exhibition and this is expected to happen late October or early November. The RWA has advised that there will be an exhibition period for future heritage work at the ATP so people have an opportunity to see what is proposed and comment before works are undertaken. This follows some concerns being expressed about aspects of the recent restorations in Innovation Plaza. There has also been a request for a mechanism for input of suggestions or projects to the ATP. The ATP Section 170 Register and the Heritage Asset Management Strategy (HAMS) can now be found on the ATP website at www.atp.com.au/atp-heritage.  

Heritage Installations in ATP Innovation Plaza

The 26-tonne heritage pivot crane and the locomotive steam crane are now on permanent display in Innovation Plaza following this area returning to public use. You can see more on the 30th October open day. Here is the link to a recent article in the ATP newsletter History Showcase at Innovation Plaza

Work on Locomotive Workshops Bays 1 & 2

The facades of Bays 1 and 2 have been receiving a face-lift with cracks being repaired to protect the wall. Wrought Artworks have been working around the renovations. A concept plan for creating a heritage exhibition space within Bays 1 and 2 North has been developed by Dr MacLaren North and presented to members of the Eveleigh Steering Committee. The idea is to create an interactive space so tenants and visitors can view the machinery up close. Signs and notice boards will reveal the history of the heritage artefacts. The presentation about what is proposed is supposed to be on the ATP website in the near future.

Update on Other Eveleigh News dealing with Heritage

Some of you may know that the RWA is being wound into a new Sydney Metropolitan Development Authority. The RWA always was envisaged as having a limited life and attention is now moving to how some initiatives might continue after the absorption of the RWA into the new Sydney wide CMDA. The RWA will continue its current programmes in the immediate future including work on Heritage. 

In the absence of a decision by the NSW government to sell a 99 year lease on the ATP, the ATP will be transferred into the new SMDA. Given the earlier announcement that the ATP was to be sold it is important that there be robust Heritage arrangements in place to protect the site and its important moveable heritage. The provisions of the new CMP will be important in this, as will the site being seen within a wider Eveleigh context as envisaged in the Eveleigh Heritage Interpretation Strategy.

The decision on the sale of North Eveleigh has been delayed by the City Relief Line project. The NSW government has announced that it will not require residential property around Leamington Avenue and that work on the dive will be confined to the North Eveleigh site. The RWA is still completing its assessment of the impact, if any, of the City Relief Line on North Eveleigh and will then report back to cabinet. It is expected that after this clarification the government will be able to proceed with the sale of the site. REDWatch continues to support Sydney University purchasing this site and we have been pleased that Sydney University has been involved on the Eveleigh Steering Committee.

Work is also being proposed to remediate the old gas works part of the Macdonaldtown end of the Eveleigh site. The Environmental Assessment including Heritage Report will go up under MP 09_0145 - Gasworks Remediation when it is ready for exhibition.

With the LES now to be used for Rail Heritage purposes the RWA has been asked to remove the planning controls they put in place to allow for the building of a 12 storey building on the site. I understand that this is currently with the Department of Planning and we hope the controls will be changed in the near future.

Conclusion – Make sure you put your ideas forward now!

When heritage groups asked the Minister to set up a Eveleigh Heritage Taskforce we all had high hopes for what it this might achieve. The initial 12 month lifespan of the taskforce, the wider brief, the project mechanism and the logistical task of bringing ideas and people together has meant that we have not achieved as much as many of us had hoped. Progress however has been made and Eveleigh and Redfern Waterloo Heritage are firmly on the agenda into the future. The area’s heritage was one of the strongest elements recognised people living within 10km of Redfern in a recent survey about Redfern.

With many changes coming to the former railway site, the RWA and the RWHT it is very important that we make sure that people’s ideas and aspirations for the heritage future of Eveleigh are covered in the Eveleigh Heritage Interpretation Strategy and in the report from the RWHT to the Minister. This is particularly so with the possibility of change of state government in March 2011.

I hence encourage you to come to the Field Day on 30th October and to make your input. If you are unable to come I would encourage you to send an email to Juliet Suich who is guiding the RWHT work at juliet.suich@rwa.nsw.gov.au.

I look forward to seeing you on the 30th October.

Regards,

Geoffrey Turnbull

Spokesperson

REDWatch

Ph Wk: (02) 8004 1490  Mob: 0418 457 392

email: mail@redwatch.org.au

web: www.redwatch.org.au