Regular readers of this column will be fed up with my thoughts on the Convention Centre. However, I will repeat myself. We must never, ever, ever accept this white elephant building from Central Government. They built it. They can keep it.
Our original Convention Centre struggled to hold its head above water and it cost $20m. It was run brilliantly by Bryan Pearson and his team at VBase. Nobody in this former team have been consulted on what the new Convention Centre should be like. Somebody in Wellington, who knew better than our local team, decided on the size and setting of the current white elephant and have spent at least $500m.
We keep getting sing-song stories from ChristchurchNZ saying how fabulous it is that we have got it.
In December I received this note from Cam Preston who has been following this monster very carefully. Here is what he wrote:
Sadly, to date they only have three international events attracting only 1,650 new people to our city for the first three years, and seemingly no national events.
While there are some local events, these don’t contribute to the city as they would have been held at the town hall or other venue instead.
Remembering that international conventions normally have a three-year lead in, I can’t see the situation getting any better for a while.
Anyway, although this is now a taxpayer millstone (not a ratepayer one), I still wonder whether there were other areas all this money could have been spent more effectively in attracting people to the city?
Still all those highly paid consultants and PR people at ChristchurchNZ and Otakaro Ltd should be able to roll it in glitter for us all come opening day!
Now consider this. Treasury will be busting their shirt buttons to get this off their Balance Sheet. Pressure will come on CCC to take it over, even if it’s for nothing. The cost of maintaining this huge building will be enormous. Just think about the staffing and heating bills on their own. I spoke yesterday to a person working for one of the sub-contractors building the building. He is staggered at the complexity of the systems within the building. These will cost of fortune to maintain.
I took this photo from across the road from the evolving Convention Centre last week. It demonstrates how this building will soak up all of the Council finances, and the surrounding buildings, given half a chance. It appeared to me to be absorbing the beautiful brick building like a ginormous great gobulating triffid.
One serious conversation this City is going to have to have is what the hell will we do with this monster? It possibly isn’t going to have many conventions. In fact, with Global Warming, are conventions going to diminish? Grand events will be the exception, rather than the rule.
Do we need to start thinking about bringing parts of the University back into town to use this building? Send me your thoughts on what uses there could be for a Government blunder which we have to find some viable uses for.
Leave a Reply