Forget the building: focus on the city On Sirius

摘要

SYDNEY is blessed with many cultural 'treasures', not least its wealth of heritage buildings. The city's heritage places reveal much, not only about the lives, hopes and aspirations of their builders but also of those who have campaigned for their protection. Elizabeth Farrelly's warning that the destruction of such treasures will end in the destruction of culture, and perhaps even result in the demise of the city itself is stark. The controversy surrounding the fate of Sydney's brutalist Sirius building suggests that we haven't learnt the lessons of the Green Bans of the 1970s which fought against threats to Sydney's heritage fabric and integrity. Such a failure to learn from past lessons is perhaps an indictment on our elected representatives but is also a reflection of the emerging armchair activism of our time, possibly in equal parts.