Freeways and Foreshores
The north shore of Perth Water fronting the Central Busiess District has been frequently changed since the arrival of Europeans in 1829. Various forms and structures have appeared and been removed over the last 180 years. Jetties, ports and various forms of reclamation have moved the shore considerably into Perth Water. The main eras of reclamation were in the 1870s, 1900s, 1920s-1937, 1955 1959, and 1967.
Over the years, more than 200 proposals have been presented and considered by planners and politicians. Some of the ideas never existed as more than drawings, while others, like the freeway interchange built in the 1970s and Elizabeth Quay, have been partially or fully realised. Most, like a 1931 scheme to build a large island in the middle of the Swan, were never considered realistic.
Local designers use the term 'Perthed' to describe the many downgrades to large urban visions that have occured over the years, many of which have involved the redevelopment of the Swan River foreshore. Landscape architect John Oldham's 1960s vision for a series of botanic gardens encircling Perth Water from the University of WA around the riverfront to the South Perth Zoo, is a scheme that was Perthed. Only John Oldham Park, nestled around the freeway interchange at Mount's Bay, survives from Oldham's original vision. Oldham was one of the first landscape architects in Perth and he was initially not interested in being involved in the freeway interchange, but he came onboard to produce a landscape scheme that would at least try and soften it. He was promised that if he got involved in the freeway interchange other things would happen, but John Oldham Park is the only part of the vast urban forest he envisaged that became a reality.
During the post World War II years, the freeway was seen as being a prized feature of modernity. To have a freeway was seen as making Perth modern and keeping up with the rest of the world. Perth's Metropolitan Regional Scheme, proposed by British town planner Professor Gordon Stephenson and Town Planning Commissioner Alastair Hepburn and adopted in 1955, gave primacy to the private automobile. The scheme, used as the blueprint for the development of Perth over the next 50 years, proposed a network of freeways that would the transport arteries of the city, the first to be built being the Kwinana Freeway.
Up until the building of the Narrows Bridge, the major entry points into the CBD were William and Barrack Streets from the north, Wellington and Mount Streets from the west, Wellington Street and Adelaide Terrace from the east and Mounts Bay Road from the south west. The Narrows Bridge not only brought traffic into the city from the south, but presented the opportunity to create an interchange on reclaimed land around Mounts Bay where the Kwinana Freeway, Stirling Highway, Riverside Drive and the yet-to-be-built Mitchell Freeway from the north could meet and re-direct traffic around the city centre.
Riverside Drive, layed as a subsistence project in 1937, was originally designed as a boulevarde intended to encourage tourists and Perth residents alike to travel along the river, in a 20th-century version of the 18th and 19th century tradition of promenading. The whole reason for building it was to give access to the river, but ironically, when its development had the opposite effect. Riverside Drive was widened when works on the Mitchell Freeway interchange commenced in the late 1950s.
Riverside Drive, 1962
In the early 1960s, a proposal to turn Riverside Drive into major freeway along the foreshore was prepared by consultants for the Main Roads Department. Their plan was to build a circle of freeways around the CBD, spiralling out from the Narrows Interchange, accompanied by a network of car parks. At the time, many cities around the world were experimenting with ways to stop the choking of their cities centres by motor vehicles, and the use of ring roads and associated car parks around the city's perimeter was a logical option. Many British cities still have ring roads with accompanying car parks from which communters enter the city centre by public transport. Sydney and Perth were the only Australian cities to adopt simliar schemes, and in both instances, they would end up being Perthed.
Perth City Council town planner Paul Ritter, and others, argued that traffic volumes didn't warrant the plan, and that the new north-south freeway system was adequate. Visiting architect Theodore Osmundson suggested in 1968 that the city ring freeway project being considered would "encircle the city like an iron collar [which] can only eventually choke the central city to death". Car parks were built at the foot of William Street alongside the Interchange, and at the city end of The Causeway on the site of the East Perth 'Car Barn' (tram depot, then trolley bus depot) opposite the WACA Ground. The William Street car park, situated where Elizabeth Quay has been built, was always well patronised though its size was reduced progressively over its 30 year life until it disappeared completely when the Perth Convention Centre was built. The Causeway car parks and their accompanying shuttle buses into the city centre were shunned by motorists and were quietly phased out. The northern section of the ring road would eventually be built underground as the Graham Farmer Freeway, however it was never seen as part of the 1960s ring road scheme.
Riverside Drive today
Riverside Drive was further modified in the 1970s to provide access to the Mitchell Freeway and again in the late 2000s as part of the sinking of the railway to William Street. In 1988 a foreshore redevelopment scheme included a focus on development along Langley Park to the east, as well as a number of pedestrian overpasses crossing Riverside Drive. The CityVision group has submitted a number of other designs for public discussion since then. In December 1990, Premier Carmen Lawrence announced plans for an international design competition for a foreshore redevelopment. The competition had a first prize of $50,000 which was awarded to U.S. design firm Carr, Lynch, Hack and Sandell. The winning design included a cable car from Barrack Street to Mount Eliza and Kings Park. It was never built.
In February 2011 plans for a new project were announced, which included the construction of an artificial inlet near The Esplanade Reserve, with modifications to the surrounding environs including Barrack Square. Nine large building sites for residential apartments, commercial offices and retail space were set aside. The scheme became a reality in 2016 with the opening of Elizabeth Quay. By then, Riverside Drive had been replaced by The Graham Farmer Freeway as the major east-west thoroughfare around the inner city. As there is no longer a need for it to link to the Narrows interchange, Riverside Drive now terminates at the foot of Barrack Street as it did before the Interchange was built.
Elizabeth Quay
