The $775 million price tag for a stadium at Hobart’s Macquarie Point does not include the cost of building a multi-storey underground car park, or relocating the heritage-listed Goods Shed, the agency in charge of the build has confirmed.
Macquarie Point Development Corporation chief executive Anne Beach told a Budget Estimates Hearing that the three-level private car park inside the stadium, currently designed to accommodate 536 cars, was not included in the cost estimate as it was a “whole-of-precinct outcome”.
“It’s not included in the project because it’s not specific to the project,” she said.
“It won’t be open to the public as such, it’s more a facility to support the precinct outcomes.”
Anne Beach and Minister for Sport Nic Street recently unveiled design plans for the AFL stadium. (ABC News: Luke Bowden)
The development application submission for the stadium stated the car park’s upper level would be at the same height as the stadium’s playing surface, and provide parking for officials, players and “to support the operations of the function room”, as well as some accessible parking for patrons.
Ms Beach said the organisation intended to recoup the cost of building the car park by taking it to market and selling it to a private operator, in the same way it intends for $55 million of unfunded “revenue-generating features” not included in the $775 million cost estimate, including a food and beverage fit out, CCTV and LED advertising signage.
She told the hearing it was too early to disclose the cost of building the car park.
“That work is still very preliminary and that will involve market testing, and we’re still working through the options,” she said.
The heritage-listed Goods Shed has been re-imagined as an events and market space. (Supplied: MPDC)
Costing exclusions escalating final build price
Ms Beach also confirmed the cost of relocating the heritage-listed Goods Shed to make way for the stadium, was also not included in the cost estimate — nor was establishing an access road at the north of the Macquarie Point site.
She said the cost of moving the Goods Shed would depend on whether it was disassembled, stored off site and reassembled elsewhere, or whether it was relocated as one parcel.
Greens Leader Rosalie Woodruff said the cost of the stadium, which had initially been estimated at $715 million, “just keeps growing”.
The Greens claim the cost of the stadium now sits at $830 million, once the $55 million of “revenue-generating features” are added to the $775 million budget.
“Now we’ve exposed the fact it won’t stop there. There are huge and costly projects that the government have excluded from their cost calculations,” Dr Woodruff said.
The Macquarie Point precinct plan. (Supplied: Macquarie Point Development Corporation)
Dr Woodruff said the Greens had “always said this stadium was going to cost over a billion dollars. Well, a sod hasn’t even been turned, and we’re already most of the way there”.
“The Liberals need to stop with their shameless cover-ups and come clean with the true, total cost of delivering the stadium project. Better yet, just ditch the project altogether and spend the money on health and housing instead.”
Premier Jeremy Rockliff has repeatedly insisted the government’s contribution towards the project is capped at $375 million, with private investment to cover the cost of $145 million in building works, the already-identified “revenue-generating features”, and then any further cost blowouts.
Loading…Loading…
