by Robert Farnan

The campaign to Save Festival Plaza is very alive.

After my recent article: Turning point for Plaza tower (2 November 2025) many readers have written to the Premier; thank you.

But if not, please do so, by writing to Premier@sa.gov.au - however brief your email. This could make a huge difference at this point, though we have an overwhelming case.

In my last report, I explained that the State Government has yielded a major part of our civic heart for $1 per annum for 100 years to a Sydney developer, for the very unlikely (and illusory) ‘activation’ of the Plaza.

But adding to that earlier information, the private office tower will be owned by Walker Corporation, so that around $35 million per year of rental income will, quite legally, be streaming OUT of the state.

Money should at least be coming INTO the State for the land.

And to add to that, a Federation Square plaza, Adelaide style, a Parliamentary square, as was planned for Festival Plaza, should, over time, attract 3 million people per year, and therefore bring INTO the state around $60 million. Especially when the plaza's viability could be turbo-charged by a world-democracy related focus.

That open plaza opportunity would be lost.

*Handing your land to an interstate developer for a skyscraper, or keeping it for the public? Your choice, Premier.*

So in net terms, the State Government is about to allow a development that gives away precious civic land, earns NOTHING for the city, but in fact would, year after year, even after effectively gifting the land, cost the State's net wealth around $35m per year, plus $60m per year in terms of lost income opportunity, in total $95m, per annum, in perpetuity.

This is throwing tens of millions into a void, each year, in perpetuity.

To recap:

With an open plaza with culturally related low-level buildings -- which complement rather than tower over our adjacent National Heritage listed Parliament House and Adelaide Park Lands -- Adelaide could be more than $60m per annum BETTER OFF than now -- in perpetuity.

And if the build were to go ahead, compared to what the outcome should be, and was expected, the city would be effectively something like $95m WORSE OFF than that per annum - and in perpetuity!

You probably will want to read all this a couple of times!

*Premier Peter Malinauskas unveiling the proposed second new Festival Plaza tower on 9 April 2024. (ABC News: Rory McClaren)*

And the above is not to mention the other hugely destructive knock-on effects, in every direction: to culture, commerce, amenity and reputation, and the leaving of a huge very unwanted and very ordinary office building as the over-towering central feature of this beautiful city, and more significantly, the city put on a reduced economic trajectory - in perpetuity.

Please act. This is a serious matter that is simultaneously bizarre and ridiculous. A simple and quick email to urge the Premier to change course, and also to also the Treasurer, Tom Koutsantonis..

You might question the Planning Minister’s figure of $1 billion per year income from the building and ask the Premier for evidence. That is an extraordinary claim for a minister, and seriously needs justification.

You might point out, respectfully, that we are eager to hear the Premier’s answers to the questions we put to him in advance of our meeting on 28 October.

*The delegation that met the Premier on 28 October 2025: From left: Ted Baillieu, Lynn Arnold, Liz Vines, Geoff Hayter, Alan Rumsby, Robert Farnan*

The public has been almost totally excluded from any input to this process and it shows in the extremely poor quality of the resulting outcomes.

This is a government that seems not realise that there is much more expertise and good judgement in the public at large than in their ranks.

A workable solution moving forward is that of a trade with the developer for land around Victoria Square that contains end-of-life government buildings, which would be a least bad outcome, but one with a very desirable thrust in rejuvenating a part of the city centre that badly needs it.

And a smartly designed plaza could contain something as simple as the demountable marquee structures in the Copenhagen plaza shown above, if only as a shorter term measure whilst something like a global competition was run.