Blackburne managing director Paul Blackburne says the former Pavilion Market site could sit vacant for the foreseeable future if City of Subiaco councillors don’t support an application for a 24-storey mixed use development at a meeting tonight.
As we all know the old a Subiaco Pavilion Markets site has sat as a derelict eyesore for over a decade.
This iconic location in the town centre should be a world class mixed-use development with an active and vibrant ground floor.
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READ NOWBlackburne purchased the site seven months ago, despite the challenging property market conditions, and decided to invest in the future of Subiaco.
We built a team of the best architects, interior designers and planners to ensure we created an incredible mixed-use development that would breathe new life back into Subi.
I’m a local, Blackburne are local and we love Subiaco.
Our plans were lodged with council three months ago and during the public comment period over 530 people responded with 86 per cent in favour of the development.
The Responsible Authority Report (RAR), together with the Design Review Panel (DRP) of five top independent architects, have both recommended approval, with the DRP awarding the project an almost perfect score for design excellence.
Given such overwhelming support from the public, heritage consultants and council’s professional staff, people are expecting their councillors to do what they can to help make this project happen.
As we know everyone won’t be happy as some people believe it’s “too high” despite the inclusion of $17 million in public benefits we are giving back to the community.
At tonight’s council meeting, Subiaco councillors are most likely to vote strongly in favour of the project, however as always with any visionary project there will be some people that try to delay or obstruct progress.
If the project does not get approved in its current form, then it is most likely that the site will sit vacant for another decade or even worse, our new design could be replaced by a cheaper, inferior project with little public benefit, which would be a tragedy for Subiaco.
Tonight, Subiaco councillors have a chance to show the people of WA they do support good high quality development in the right areas.
They can prove that they want what’s best for the future of Subiaco and its ratepayers and not continue the catastrophe that this iconic site has become.