Macquarie Point Development Corporation CEO Anne Beach joined Brent and Painey for an in-depth chat about the stadium after the concept designs were released yesterday.
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SEN Tassie
Macquarie Point Development Corporation CEO Anne Beach (08/07/24)
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Nice to see you. Good. I want to turn your mark on them. We can actually hear you better. How are you? Good to see you. Good. Thanks for having me. Massive 24 hours. Finally we can have a look and see what this and your vision looks like from Macquarie Point. How's the feedback been so far? Oh, it's been great. And it's really exciting to finally get these out there. We've been working on this for a little while. And to start sharing our work is super exciting. It has been a really positive response. We have worked really hard to get something that felt like it landed. It lives in this space and that's been a lot of the response that we've had. Yeah, someone said to me last night, it looks like more of an arts entertainment complex rather than a stadium from the outside. So you really have worked it into the area nicely. Yeah. And some of the feedback's been not only does it work in this space, but it almost looks like you could pick it up and put it anywhere into Tasmania. And I think that was the moment we were like, yeah, we've got this. What's been the biggest challenge for you in all this? I mean, I'm sure there's been a few, but is it one thing that you've had to navigate pretty carefully? Yeah, there's been lots of just moving parts. So lots of different things to consider, lots of different user requirements. Obviously, we've got a bunch of sensitive stakeholders around us. So to these sites, we have to have sports. We have to be really careful about things like light emission, to the west side. We have the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra. We have to be really careful about things like noise. We have residents and accommodation around us thinking about height. There's a lot of interest in our sites. We certainly get a lot of feedback. So we're trying to get as much information out there as we can, but balancing all those different needs. But I think we've found a pretty good solution to try and get a good multipurpose outcome. That's efficient and also looks great. There must be a real challenge trying to appease everyone that does have an issue, but still trying to do things the way you need them to work, I suppose. How difficult's it been and how important's Cox architecture been and all this as well to try and get all that right? Yeah, it has been important. Some of it's about how we've positioned the stadium on the site as well. So positioning it as much as we could between key sightlines and then keeping those edges down as much as we could. Cox have been fantastic to work with. They've built a bunch of stadium around the country and been part of the stadium around the world. We've had a fair bit of feedback along the way. They're always open to that. A lot of what's made in Tasmania is pretty hard to articulate, but we're pretty sure what we don't like. And they take that on board. I think all of the partners they've brought in has been really important as well. So keenly obviously their local architect has been a big part of this. They've done a bunch of beautiful and really functional buildings locally. But all of the specialist engineers, we've got engineers that are based in Germany that are down here with a team that just focus on the roof. And look at the roof and that was our make or break moment having that really elegant structure with no additional elements protruding. It's really fine. It's just one of those things that really make it work. The broader engineering team, the specialist that work on the turf, the specialist that work on the light, we've got a whole kit caboodle there. And also having a bunch of these guys in the office has been fantastic too. So we can do all of that live. We hadn't had Tim and for this interview, but I think he joins us now. Are you there Tim? I'm back. Oh, good. I thought you just muted me Brent to be fair. Oh, I thought about it. Yeah. You asked the question Tim, it's over to you. I've missed the whole thing, Brent. So you just can go and I'll just come in when I can. All right, all right. Well, I guess, and we talk about some of the things you've had to navigate. The TAFS obviously become an issue and rightly such an important piece of infrastructure here. Confident you can work in with the RACL to make it not impacted at all. Oh, look, I think we just have to keep working with the RACL. But also there's other organisations like the Vietnam veterans and the friends of the soldiers' moral walk. The moral walk goes on the other side of the domain, but it also does continue up to the centre TAF as well. So obviously the things that are important to them are height and height is a really tricky one. So to get that multi-purpose functionality, particularly for cricket, we do need that height. The way we positioned the stadium in the site, we have got the highest point within those key sightlines. But obviously just that connection with the city is really important for the centre TAFS. So having a transparent roof and having that supported by a grid structure helps often that. There are a number of things we've done from a design perspective to support that integration. There's things like from a cricket perspective, obviously you need media that runs north south alongside the pitch. We've put the media pod in the south. So that means just that structural bulk sits to the south, avoiding that kind of element to the north. The good share that will be as we talked about yesterday when we released the designs will be sitting to the north of the site. And that will connect in with the concourse. We're looking at how we can include the design of that roof to enable a visual connection. So when you're in that space, you can look up and see the centre TAFS. Keeping those edges low is really important for that connection. And by not having that cricket media hub to the north, we can create views from the seating ball through to the centre TAFS and vice versa. So also looking at things like the field. So when we did the precinct plan, we made sure there was room for an MCG size field because every field is different. I get asked about the field a lot and go, is it a standard size field? There's no such thing, every stadium is different. But the big thing with MCG is it's quite wide. And that's important for rectangular sports here that bit further away. So by keeping it nice and narrow, we keep those edges a bit lower. It just softens the whole size of the building. So there's a bunch of things like that we've done to just minimise impact. I think it is going to be something we have to keep working on. But once we get this built, I think people will see how well we've integrated the two spaces. Just back on what you said about the ROC, we need the height for cricket. So how do you get around that? I mean, you're going to have to have it that high and it's going to overshadow the centre top potentially. So it's something you're going to have to give. How do you tackle that moving forward? Well, won't overshadow because it's to the south. So sunrise sunset is absolutely not impacted. And there's five sightlines. So most of those run around the stadium and there's two that have partially impacted. So because we have a transparent roof, they're only partially impacted. They already are a little bit from the vegetation. So what we just need to do is be really transparent about that. So I met with the president of the ROCL last week before we release the renders. And the commitment I gave to him is that we will share all the information that we have and that we will produce a number of renders. So it's really clear for them to see exactly the level of impact and then we can keep working on that with them. Anything for me yet? Yeah, in terms of the cricket modelling that you've done, I know you've used the ball trajectory data. But in terms of playing test cricket under that roof, can you play with under that roof without lights on underneath that? Yeah. Would you allow you to play red ball test cricket or will we only be able to play day night time of fixtures under there? No, we want to get to red ball. That's our focus. So the tricky thing is, and as you know, it can't be accredited until it's built. So what we need to do is just keep working through the detailed design process with cricket TAS and cricket Australia and work with them to breathe ICC. Make sure they have all the information available. We're workshopping with them through detailed design. So we're making sure we're factoring in everything they need. They have a clear understanding of how it's coming together. And then hopefully that sign off process is pretty smooth. But we do want to get that red ball sign off. And that's critical, I think, to enable that full content to be in the stadium. Yeah. And just, I don't know if Brent's asked this today, but sort of waking up over here this morning and just reading a lot of the comments in the mercury. People asking about the photos that have been released seem to be from good angles. Are we expecting to see ones sort of from mirrors from the water line to see how much it will impact from that side as well? And when will they come if we do? Yeah, so what we released yesterday is kind of what we're calling a sneak peek. So a lot of work goes into creating those photo quality renders. What we're putting together is a full package that we've part of our application through the project estate significance process. And we'll have a whole collection of view lines. And we'll look to create any of those that then come up with further questions. But there will be views looking to and from the city. And we will look to replicate some of those where there are some already in the public domain where people are keen to see like an equivalent. There's probably one in particular that looking at the hunt street facade where there's a pretty solid mass. So we've looked to, I guess, superimposed that visual into the model that the team have built so you can see an equivalent of that. I got asked about that a bit yesterday, so we'll look to get that up on our website so people can see that pretty quickly because we have already done that one. How that kind of looks is because we've kept those edges really low, it's basically just the transparent roof and the sort of supporting annulus that you see. Because we have kept it at a similar scale to the existing street facade. And is it? In terms of the construction by 2029 timeline. I don't know if you know, but the guy sitting to your left there is a construction expert. And he has repeatedly said it cannot possibly be done. So can you... I said 20 days ago. Look, the thing that drives the timeline is the sequencing, right? So we need to do things like get the structure in place and then get the turf to the right quality. And that's what we're working through. So what we're working on is we need to start as soon as possible. So once we get this post submission in, we'll be preparing basically for how do we gear up for the construction phase. So we'll be doing everything possible to make that timeline. We're pretty confident that we can do it. If we fall into the early parts of 2029, we're still going to be ready for that season. But we'll be targeting the end of 2028. And Beaches our guest on SCN Tassie breakfast. She is the CEO of Macquarie Point Development Corporation. Just on that. When would we see a shoveling the ground? There's diggers there and stuff at the moment. When would we actually see potentially like the first part of the study being built, do you think? Well, we love to dig a hole. So we already have a few diggers on site. Part of our core business is already doing a fair bit of, I guess, remediation and stuff. So there's a bit of activity happening at the moment. We're just finishing off the last piece of major remediation. So we've just moved around about 12,000 metres cubed of soil and bringing that corner on Davey and Evan Street back down to ground level. So our core business is basically side prep. And that's one of the things that help us move really fast on this. So that work's already happening. We'll be looking to gear up to move straight away after we get approval. So once we get that planning approval we just need to progress with building and then we'll be ready to go. Do you know when that could possibly be though? So it's a 12 month planning assessment process. We'll be looking to make a submission this month. So end of this month's equivalent next year. Okay, that's all we'll see some action. Cool. We just need to get a building approval. So just a bit of a buffer there and then we'll be ready to move. Okay. Nothing from you team? I just don't know any at all. Well, again, I don't want to back over things because I missed the whole stuff because you muted me. But someone who knows absolutely everything about this site and the designs and everything goes. But it must be incredibly frustrating to continually read stuff that says that it can't happen and why it can't happen when you know other what's. Oh, look, it can be. But look, it's probably on us to get a lot more info out there. So it is one of those things. It's a little bit like the Olympics. Everyone's an expert until they're not. So everyone's got a lot of expertise in quality surveying of discovery over the last 18 months. But look, we just need to get, we need to keep working through this process. And as we do the work, we need to release it. And the trick is to, we need to not only release it, we need to release it in a way that's accessible so that people can understand it. So one of the things is we've built a 3D model of all the geotech data that we have. That's pretty crunchy and exciting if you're into geotech. It's less accessible for everyone else. So we're just trying to create a little animation that kind of explains what that is, what we've got, how we use it. We'll get that up on our website. We'll make our submission to the TAS planning commission. We're looking at a few things and the things that stand out to us that people are concerned about and interested about are transport and the economics. So we're going to try and get, in parallel to finishing that work, we're going to try and get some help with some common specialists to pull out some of the crunchy data to make sure you don't have to be an expert in that and read the reports to understand what they say. So it's just a balance for us to move really fast, get it right, but also try and find a way to make this accessible because people want to understand, but it is really intense and some of it is quite complex. It's trying to balance that, but look, I think part of this is, it just reflects the people care, right? They're excited. There's a long history in this site and the onus is on us to get into this next phase and make something happen. Put a text on the Harkotts open line here for you and Harkotts more than just real estate professionals. Good morning, Essie and Tazzy breakfast magnificent Macquarie Point Precinct News on Sunday. Can you please ask the Macpoint CEO, who I believe is doing a brilliant job. The architect did mention on Sunday seat expansion capacity, however, was what total 40,000 was previously mentioned. Can you answer that one for us now? Yes, so as a minimum, we need to have 23,000 seats. That's what's in the agreement and that's what we're looking at as a base. We are looking at structurally how we could support an expansion and there's a few things to think about in that and that's where having a team like Cox is really important at the start of that conversation because you can imagine the difference between 25,000 and 40,000 structurally is a completely different build because it's double the number. We have key structural elements like a roof that go with that and you can imagine it's not just a case of plugging in more seats. It's all the things that service the people that sit in those seats. It's a bigger concourse, it's wider stairs, it's more food and beverage, it's more toilets because you can jam more people in there but if you have to wait half an hour to go to the toilet and you miss a quarter, no one's going to be pretty stoked about that. Also, there's the emergency stuff that goes without so we need to keep it safe. When we did the footprint for the stadium, as I said, we made sure it was probably a bit bigger than we thought we needed in the precinct plan, just in case. When it's come to the design, we're looking at keeping it around that 23,000 and then how much can we fit in without needing to make a substantial structural change investment, which is the key thing. We don't want to be knocking down this beautiful roof just to fit in a few more seats. We can get to around 30,000 just over around that sort of space without having to make any major structural changes. So what Alistair talked about yesterday is we're consciously of building gaps in the bowl. There's also the sort of back where we can plug seats in the design in the way the plats are done. It's also thinking about the way we can do a spectrum of offerings. So one of the things stadiums TARS have been talking to us about is it's not just seated. Sometimes you can have structured standing so we can have a space, we can catch up with some mates and some people are looking to do those different types of offerings in stadium. So we'll look at all those different things. What about the infrastructure in terms of the public transport and stuff? What sort of stuff is going into? I haven't had a chance to read through it, but I know I went to a huge event here today and it just made the day even better. When you're moving 140,000 people and it was seamless, it just makes any event that you're going to so much better if we get those things right. Yeah, 100%. It is critical that we get the transport element right. And for Tazwegians, we need to get over the expectation you can get a rock star park if you want to go somewhere and that's just not how stadium work. Sorry to move this quantum of people, you can't get everyone a car park because if we built an epic car park, everyone would be sitting in their car for hours to get out again. Having said that, there are already a huge number of car parks in the city. We have thousands of people that come into the city every day, Monday to Friday, to get to work that we've all navigated to get here today, not you, but Brett and I did. So it's utilising the things that are already there, but look at things like Optes. When I went to Optes Stadium for a game, I had no idea where I was and how I was going to get there. I just stood at the bus stop, saw the right bus, jumped on it, you get there, you go to the gate that focuses on the public transport element, go in, find your seat, come back out the same way, find the same number, stand there, get on it and somehow you end up back where you were. That's what we need to do. We need to have a really efficient game day bus service and that will be critical here. So we already have the infrastructure to do that. And that's the way we've designed the stadium. So there will be four gates. The southeast one, that will be our main plaza. That was one of the renders we released yesterday that showed all those people walking into the space. That's where we expect people coming in from Sullivan's Cove, where they've been out in the city or they're already in the city and we get that connection. In the northeast that's sort of pointing up towards Regatta Point, that's going to be our public transport focus, where we will have places for buses that are just pumping through, getting people in and out, getting people in and out of that space. So it's well designed, well synchronized and a little bit of encouraging people that on game day it's okay to jump on a bus. And we could sit here and talk about this all day. It's so exciting and so much to unpack. Unfortunately, we run out of time. But close to say, if you're interested in all this, Alistair Richardson will be my special guest on the Devil's Advocate this afternoon. We'll deep dive into some of the nitty gritty around Macquarie Point, but really appreciate your time coming in this morning. It's such a busy time for you. So thanks very much. Thanks, Homie, and we will be making your submission, hopefully lay this month, so happy to come back and chat. We'd love to get you on as much as we can. And Beach joining us, the CEO of Macquarie Point Development Corporation. We're off to our next break here on SCN Tazzy Breakfast, powered by Kubota. Take on any job with Kubota's range of tractors, males and utility vehicles. Make sure you get us on the Hark Orts Open Line. Loving your text this morning. Hark Orts results for you. 0437, 5552535. [MUSIC PLAYING] (upbeat music)