KEY POINTS:
Auckland City Mayor John Banks is fizzing about the "collaborative process" between his council and the Auckland District Health Board which has resulted in the board advertising for expressions of interest in refurbishing historic Building 5 at the former Green Lane Hospital.
He says it "could bring a
new lease of life for a building with great character whose demise would have been a great loss for the city". Here's hoping.
Certainly the future for this century-old landmark seems a lot brighter than it did in February when Auckland City issued a demolition consent permitting the building to be bowled to make way for 30-odd carparks.
Since then the outrage of campaigners such as health professional Helen Geary, heritage activist Allan Matson, Auckland Regional Council chairman Mike Lee and councillor Sandra Coney and Mr Banks himself, has shamed the health board into a rethink. They all deserve our thanks.
Together they forced health board chairman Pat Snedden in March to raise the white flag and plead for a two-year breather "where people can look at alternative uses of that building".
Now Mr Snedden is back, admitting that conservation architects have reported "the condition of the building makes it economically viable for it to be adapted to a modern usable standard" and that "there was a less than 10 per cent margin between the costs of adapting Building 5 for re-use and the construction of a new building using the same footprint".
Proposals are now being sought from developers prepared to refurbish the building at their cost in return for a long-term lease at a peppercorn rental.
Various conditions will be imposed on the renovators, but glaringly absent, given the circumstances, are any requirements in the documentation regarding heritage preservation.
The health board's general counsel, Bruce Northey, says that although this isn't spelt out, preserving the heritage aspects "is so obvious, it's implied".
It was a fundamental condition, and there would be no logic to the enterprise otherwise.
I agreed that in a civilised city, protecting and enhancing the historic fabric of such a building would be the obvious priority.
But we were talking Auckland, and you only have to look at the gutted bones of the Jean Batten Building in Queen St to know that heritage protection means whatever you choose it to mean.
Mr Northey says there is a commitment to retaining the external aspects of the building, though he draws the line at repainting it in its original "stark, dark Victorian" hues.
Internally the grand, open-ward spaces will be retained in the form of a large open-plan type office space, upstairs and down, although architects have advised the pressed, steeled ceilings might have to be sacrificed.
Refusing to be put off by the economic downturn, Mr Northey says it's a "rare opportunity to be sited on a most attractive site next to Cornwall Park".
Mr Banks is optimistic "we're 7 out of 10" in saving the building, though he concedes "unless we bring this proposition together, the future of the building is seriously compromised - if not this year or next year, then sometime in the future".
What he's referring to is the city's flawed system of protecting old buildings. Despite pressure from the ARC, which scores it at more than 70, and assorted other heritage experts, council experts give it only 49 on their heritage scale, one mark short of a pass into the lowest of the council's heritage rankings.
The council's arcane and arbitrary heritage scoring system has come under growing ridicule in recent months.
Perhaps the most glaring example of the elasticity of the gradings involves the old Fitzroy Hotel building in Wakefield St, which, thanks only to the economic decline, clings to life.
In 2004, when it came to the council's attention as a suitable place to save, officials failed it with a 47 score.
Under pressure from campaigner Mr Matson, it moved slowly up to 57, then 61 and finally 72 - or three off the top rung.
With the health board's wrecking ball now packed away, it's easy to say Building 5's disputed heritage score is now irrelevant. But it isn't. If no "suitable" renovators front up, the board can as easily reinstate the death sentence.
During this period of reprieve, we have to improve our heritage protection system - just in case.
