A number of proposals that have demolished heritage places or exceeded height limits in heritage areas in the CBD have been approved in the last three years. They have all been subject to approvals by the Minister for Planning, and permitted often without the chance for submission or Appeal.

With the apparent ease of achieving a permit for a development not normally allowed by planning restrictions, developers are increasingly ignoring long established heritage listings and height controls. Other places have been identified as having heritage value but have never been protected with heritage overlays.

Windsor Hotel

City Buildings unprotected

Please help us by making your voice heard.

Windsor redevelopment

Hotel from southeast.

Rendering of new development (Emerald Twilight)

The Minister for Planning appointed an Advisory Committee in December 2009 to provide advice on the matter. The report is expected soon. Go to our minisite savethewindsor.com for more information, and how you can help.

80 Collins Street / Le Louvre

Corner of Collins

and Exhibition

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An office tower is proposed by the Queensland Investment Corporation in front of Nauru House, now known as 80 Collins Street. While the new ground level glass boxes would go some way to repair the damage left when heritage buildings were demolished in the 1970s, the tower would completely dominate the famous 'Paris End' of Collins Street. Partly supported on legs, perched above the old and new buildings, it would be built to the very edge of the street for the full height of 40+ storeys. It would especially dominate heritage buildings at its base such as the Le Louvre store (click here for the classification) and the 1867 townhouse on the corner.

Griffiths Tea Warehouse c1900

Even though Melbourne's CBD is the location of some of the most important and impressive buildings in Victoria, the range of buildings that are protected by City of Melbourne heritage controls has not been updated since 1984 - that's more than 25 years !

As a result, many buildings that most people would believe are proteted are not, especially many Art Deco and Mid Centruy Modern places; but notable buildings from earlier eras have also been missed. There are even concentrations of buildings that would make excellent new heritage precincts. The attached letter outlines the issues and documents many of the unprotected places in the CBD.

"Little Lon" terraces to be demolished

Terraces

Warehouse and Leitrim Hotel

Amongst the unprotected heritage buildings in the city is this pair of terraces at 120-122 Little Lonsdale Street, which are amongst the oldest built in the city. The ground floors were built not long after the gold rush in c1855, and the top floors added in 1865, and they are in close to original condition. They are some of the few residential terraces remaining in the central city, and are part of a streetscape of 19th century buildings in the once notorious Little Lonsdale Street area of the city. The terraces are known to have been boarding houses, and would have catered to the poorer sections of society. The former pub, the 'Exploration Hotel' next door was one of the many that dotted this section of town, while just to the west the elaborate 1888 'Leitrim hotel' would have provided more cheap accomodation, and the Edwardian warehouse on the corner of Bennetts Lane would have provided employment. The streetscape could be considered one of the few intact reminders of the ‘little lon’ area, Melbourne’s 19th century underbelly, peopled by societie's outcasts, the poor, aged, infirm or criminal, and home to many brothels. After concerted 'cleaning up', by the early 20th century the pub had been closed down, and all of the buildings were part of Chinatown.

The terraces and the pub were recommended for protection in a study in 2000, but this never eventuated, and while the pub has recently been sympathetically upgraded, the terraces are proposed to be replaced by an apartment tower. The Trust has objected to the demolition, but without heritage controls, their future, and indeed the whole block, looks dim.