UTAS is apparently loosing its shine as a corporate citizen and there is a risk that it will also loose its Social Licence too. In a way its not too surprising. In Launceston they have been trampling all over ratepayer's aspirations in concert with 'the Council'.
The with so much contention in the air UTAS just could not resist getting its hubris out and putting it on display in Hobart. So here are some of the responses they have drawn in The Mercury.
HOT TOPIC: FLANAGAN AND UNI’S CITY SHIFT
Call a halt and reassess
RICHARD Flanagan is right to point to the serious problems presented by the University of Tasmania’s handling of its decision to relocate into the CBD (Talking Point, April 20).
The university is “of Tasmania”, after all, with an obligation to engage with the Tasmanian community in an open and direct fashion, something it has not done so far.
Professor Black is an able champion of the need for the university to rethink and reshape itself, but he has inherited a management that has largely lost touch with the real values of education and research.
The shortcomings in the university’s proposal, the evident lack of genuine consultation, and the considerable opposition the proposal has generated ought to lead the university to call a halt to the current process, reassessing where it is and where it might be heading.
Who gave permission?
RICHARD Flanagan was spot on about Tas Uni moving into the city. I cannot believe Hobart City Council is incapable of seeing what is going to happen and identifying the consequences.
Who gives permission for Tas Uni to make the city centre a campus? Surely the council is responsible for managing the nature and atmosphere of Hobart.
Hobart’s traffic problems are the consequence of lack of foresight from some time back but if the university is allowed to colonise the city centre, all that traffic which currently parks at Sandy Bay will move into West and North Hobart displacing the people who work in the city but park in those suburbs just a walking distance from the city centre.
Already those suburbs are parked during working hours. I imagine students will park there overnight and cause further problems for residents who currently can’t park outside their own houses during the day.
Quite frankly I cannot imagine a student from overseas preferencing a university consisting of disconnected ugly office blocks and having no obvious cohesive centre over one situated at the existing site where students meet their peers in pleasant grounds.
The university has become a money-making machine and we the residents of Hobart are going to become collateral damage.
Bees start buzzing
THE move of UTAS to Hobart has been an issue that hasn’t caused the bees in my bonnet to buzz, until I saw that Richard Flanagan thinks it is a terrible idea.
I know a few people with work connections to UTAS and they are also scornful of the idea. As I ask around and read around, I discover it is progressing with the speed of an alpine avalanche, even though nearly everyone thinks it is a terrible idea, leading to the questions – why, and what is the hidden agenda?
Launceston, too
THE proposed move into central Hobart continues to confuse most of us.
The many questions asked by Richard Flanagan deserve answers. An almost parallel situation is evolving in Launceston where the university is proposing to move from its Newnham campus site to Inveresk, which adjoins the city centre.
The Inveresk site is very limited in area and sits on the crust of the ancient Invermay swamp, which is likely to liquefy with the next major Tamar Valley geological event, considered by some geologists to be long overdue.
Even today heavy transports vibrate grounds and buildings as they pass. In scale, location and logistics, the Newnham campus site is similar to the Sandy Bay site in many respects.
What is the truth behind the proposed moves? Is the plan to make easy access near impossible for most students, thereby forcing them to go online rather than attending on-site lectures thus creating more enrolments and an even greater profit, for whom?
That’s me gone
THANK you, Richard Flanagan. I was privileged to know you many years ago, when you were a graduate assistant. I was also privileged to work at UTAS for over 25 years, and to study there as a mature- age student (nowadays very mature!) since 2005.
Having completed a degree in Antarctic Science I am enrolled in the university’s new Legal Studies degree, which is just fantastic and completion of which means a very great deal to me. However, for practical reasons, the day Law and Humanities move into the city will be the day I withdraw (very reluctantly) from the course. Please UTAS, re-think.
QUICK VIEWS
Benefit over boldness
GOOD on you Richard Flanagan for expressing what many are thinking about the Tas Uni move (Talking Point, April 20). The patronising attitude of those in charge is sadly predictable and the hype and spin for the move has reached new levels of idiocy.
Everything, it appears, must be exciting, bold and groundbreaking instead of sensible, considered and of benefit to all Hobartians.
Can I leave my cave yet?
WOULD some caring greenie please tell me when it will be safe to leave my cave where I sought refuge from the sun because of the expanding hole in the ozone layer. Or maybe I should stay put until some other disaster called nature takes over from climate change.
Call a halt and reassess
RICHARD Flanagan is right to point to the serious problems presented by the University of Tasmania’s handling of its decision to relocate into the CBD (Talking Point, April 20).
The university is “of Tasmania”, after all, with an obligation to engage with the Tasmanian community in an open and direct fashion, something it has not done so far.
Professor Black is an able champion of the need for the university to rethink and reshape itself, but he has inherited a management that has largely lost touch with the real values of education and research.
The shortcomings in the university’s proposal, the evident lack of genuine consultation, and the considerable opposition the proposal has generated ought to lead the university to call a halt to the current process, reassessing where it is and where it might be heading.
Jeff Malpas
Grove
Who gave permission?
RICHARD Flanagan was spot on about Tas Uni moving into the city. I cannot believe Hobart City Council is incapable of seeing what is going to happen and identifying the consequences.
Who gives permission for Tas Uni to make the city centre a campus? Surely the council is responsible for managing the nature and atmosphere of Hobart.
Hobart’s traffic problems are the consequence of lack of foresight from some time back but if the university is allowed to colonise the city centre, all that traffic which currently parks at Sandy Bay will move into West and North Hobart displacing the people who work in the city but park in those suburbs just a walking distance from the city centre.
Already those suburbs are parked during working hours. I imagine students will park there overnight and cause further problems for residents who currently can’t park outside their own houses during the day.
Quite frankly I cannot imagine a student from overseas preferencing a university consisting of disconnected ugly office blocks and having no obvious cohesive centre over one situated at the existing site where students meet their peers in pleasant grounds.
The university has become a money-making machine and we the residents of Hobart are going to become collateral damage.
Bridget Landrell
West Hobart.
Bees start buzzing
THE move of UTAS to Hobart has been an issue that hasn’t caused the bees in my bonnet to buzz, until I saw that Richard Flanagan thinks it is a terrible idea.
I know a few people with work connections to UTAS and they are also scornful of the idea. As I ask around and read around, I discover it is progressing with the speed of an alpine avalanche, even though nearly everyone thinks it is a terrible idea, leading to the questions – why, and what is the hidden agenda?
Keith Anderson
Kingston
Launceston, too
THE proposed move into central Hobart continues to confuse most of us.
The many questions asked by Richard Flanagan deserve answers. An almost parallel situation is evolving in Launceston where the university is proposing to move from its Newnham campus site to Inveresk, which adjoins the city centre.
The Inveresk site is very limited in area and sits on the crust of the ancient Invermay swamp, which is likely to liquefy with the next major Tamar Valley geological event, considered by some geologists to be long overdue.
Even today heavy transports vibrate grounds and buildings as they pass. In scale, location and logistics, the Newnham campus site is similar to the Sandy Bay site in many respects.
What is the truth behind the proposed moves? Is the plan to make easy access near impossible for most students, thereby forcing them to go online rather than attending on-site lectures thus creating more enrolments and an even greater profit, for whom?
Peter Anderson
Launceston
That’s me gone
THANK you, Richard Flanagan. I was privileged to know you many years ago, when you were a graduate assistant. I was also privileged to work at UTAS for over 25 years, and to study there as a mature- age student (nowadays very mature!) since 2005.
Having completed a degree in Antarctic Science I am enrolled in the university’s new Legal Studies degree, which is just fantastic and completion of which means a very great deal to me. However, for practical reasons, the day Law and Humanities move into the city will be the day I withdraw (very reluctantly) from the course. Please UTAS, re-think.
Christine Hurley
Richmond
QUICK VIEWS
Benefit over boldness
GOOD on you Richard Flanagan for expressing what many are thinking about the Tas Uni move (Talking Point, April 20). The patronising attitude of those in charge is sadly predictable and the hype and spin for the move has reached new levels of idiocy.
Everything, it appears, must be exciting, bold and groundbreaking instead of sensible, considered and of benefit to all Hobartians.
Tim Beaumont
Hobart .
Can I leave my cave yet?
WOULD some caring greenie please tell me when it will be safe to leave my cave where I sought refuge from the sun because of the expanding hole in the ozone layer. Or maybe I should stay put until some other disaster called nature takes over from climate change.
J. Pritchard
Claremont
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