Illegal pub demolition doubles the site’s value
The big story over the last week was the illegally demolished Corkman Irish pub at Carlton.
The 159-year-old pub, which was at the corner of Leicester Street and Pelham Street near the Melbourne University law school, was demolished more than a week ago.
That was despite a council stop-work order.
It angered the state’s planning minister Richard Wynne who labelled the developers “cowboys’ and pledged to toughen the state’s laws.
Then the story became worse when a tip off from members of the public alerted the Environment Protection Authority to look at some of the waste which had been moved to a construction site at Cairnlea, in Melbourne's north-west.
It turned out the samples taken to the Cairnlea property contained asbestos.
According to the Herald Sun, the Cairnlea residency is in the name of one of the developers who is thought to be responsible for the unlawful demolition of the Irish pub.
The asbestos was allegedly transported from Carlton to Cairnlea without a permit or knowledge of the authorities.
The asbestos will have to be treated to avoid blowing on to residential properties. The authorities will place a cover over the fibres. At the same time, the people behind the transporting of the asbestos face fines of more than $700,000.
But then property agents Savills Australia, at the request of Fairfax Media, did a valuation of the site where the pub once stood and valued it at between $8 million and $10 million.
"Notionally its value would now be in the $8 million to $10 million range," Clinton Baxter, Savills Australia's director of CBD and metropolitan sales told The Age.
This is extraordinary news given that developers Stefce Kutlesovski and Raman Shaqiri bought the pub for $4.76 million last August.
The pub was demolished by Shaq Demolition and Excavation, a company half owned by Mr Shaqiri, on October 15.
by Leon Gettler, October 26th 2016
