Honey of a City wrote:Build it in the grounds of Government House. Move the Governor to a luxury apartment in the CBD as they've done in Sydney, or part of the old RAH site, and incorporate the current heritage building into a stunning post-modern gallery/music complex already surrounded by gardens and in an iconic highly accessible location. Make North Terrace the most awesome cultural, educational, botanic, entertainment, health boulevard on the planet. Give this land back to the people, and turn it from an walled archaic symbol of colonialism and privilege into an international centre of creativity, vision and opportunity. Demolish the current walls and merge the whole complex into the Parade Ground and river at the back. Convert the Parade Ground from a part time car park into a fully functional state-of-art outdoor events space fronting the river, and make the river into a 3km sculpture park. Build a beautiful footbridge over King William St to connect the whole thing with the Festival Centre/Riverbank. Don't tinker or dither - think big and then do it - now.
Totally agree with your suggestion. A new iconic, highly visible building deserved an iconic, highly visible location. Government house grounds fits the bill perfectly, a far better location than old RAH or Riverbank west of Morphett St bridge. It will be visible from both KW St and North Tce, serving as a new symbol of progress in SA.
It also reinforces and adds to North Tce as our primary cultural boulevard, and fills the gap between Parliament House and the State Library. I think the building should be very transparent, like a giant (largely) glazed pavilion sitting in the beautifully manicured gardens, which already exist there.
The existing government house could be linked as another wing to the new building, or become another museum in its own right. Lots of possibilities.
No doubt there will be squeals of protest from the parklands lovers, but we just need to get on with it and think bigger picture.