The long-awaited opening of the UWA Refectory has been halted due to delays in tenancy and final renovation approvals from The City of Perth.
To have a completely open and function Ref, it must meet the new requirements of the City’s recently changed building requirements. That being the installation of ducting on the buildings’ roofs for extraction and the approval of such by various Government departments.
According to the minutes of the 24 April Council meeting, Jack Spagnuolo, Associate Director of Commercial said,
“the completion of the project it is in the hands of the City of Perth. He says everything behind the walls is ready to go however we [The Guild etc] have only been able to open the one outlet without any extraction which is Utopia. [Jack said] that it would take approximately 60 days for approval from the City of Perth”.
Guild President Conrad Hogg said in a statement to Pelican that,
“Hold ups on the Ref project have been extremely frustrating and unavoidable. From concept to delivery, the project has been fraught with sign offs from all different levels within the university and with the City of Perth. We hope that the current hold up with the City of Perth is the last of them. The City has recently changed the approval requirements for the installation of ducting on the roofs of buildings. As such, as have had to put our plans for extraction for the outlets through the DA process for the City. Following this, a series of government departments have had to sign off on the designs, for the most part to ensure the aesthetics of the vicinity are maintained. We look forward to hearing back from the City and moving forward with the project as quickly as possible”.
At the latest Guild Council meeting held on Wednesday May 29, Managing Director of the Guild, Tony Goodman said that he is “pretty confident” that the Refectory would be open and operating by the start of Semester Two.
So far, the confirmed outlets as of Feburary 2019 that have not yet opened are, Chinese Canton, Toshine Japanese, Campus Kebabs and Cutting Board, with more to be officially announced later. Utopia, also a confirmed outlet, has been open and operating since February this year.
More to come.
Words by Sophie Minissale