About 15 years ago the planning authorities in this town used to respect and document stuff around "neighbourhood character", writes "Canberra Matters" columnist PAUL COSTIGAN.
Paul Costigan
Paul Costigan is a commentator on cultural and urban matters. There are more of his columns at citynews.com.au
"ACT federal politicians do not get involved with local stuff. They are busy with important stuff and would not want to dirty their hands with local urban and green space issues," writes "Canberra Matters" columnist PAUL COSTIGAN.
"Canberra Matters" columnist PAUL COSTIGAN takes a down-to-earth visit to the National Museum.
"People are not fools – they know when Greenslabor politicians make worthy sounding but disingenuous statements (prepared by spin doctors) and when they make statements of values they adhere to," writes columnist PAUL COSTIGAN.
The Civic stadium concept may be gone, but what's the future for the neglected Civic Olympic Pool, asks "Canberra Matters" columnist PAUL COSTIGAN.
"The ACT Greenslabor government’s standard is clear. Canberra’s streets have the capacity for bumper to bumper traffic, 24 hours a day," writes "Canberra Matters" columnist PAUL COSTIGAN.
Residents had good reasons to be puzzled by the August 16 decision by the ACT planning minister to use his precious "call-in" powers, says "Canberra Matters" columnist PAUL COSTIGAN.
"Any DA that is placed into the public domain should be easily understood and should be thoroughly checked for faults and if necessary, sent back to the proponent to be resubmitted or binned," writes columnist PAUL COSTIGAN.
"Canberra Matters" columnist PAUL COSTIGAN raises the idea of a lakeside gallery dedicated to Canberra's own visual arts.
"This government and its bureaucracy are skilled at cherry picking and misrepresenting statistics to back up their plans to abolish the RZ1 residential zone system," says "Canberra matters" columnist PAUL COSTIGAN.
For those who like to meander around on the weekend to visit visual arts galleries, one that deserves to be considered a visit has to be the ANU’s Drill Hall Gallery, writes "Canberra Matters" columnist PAUL COSTIGAN.
"If a Housing ACT development application sign appears in a neighbourhood, then locals know that significant changes may be about to happen to their neighbourhood character," writes "Canberra Matters" columnist PAUL COSTIGAN.
