Callan Park has long been recognised as Rozelle’s finest landmark. On my regular walks along the Bay Run over the past few years, I have been welcomed by the Park’s grassy fields scattered with soccer players and the occasional pelican mounted on a shabby wooden chair; I became familiar with its abandoned buildings and overgrown forestry. These motifs — charming, if not a little frayed at the edges — were frozen in time and etched into my memory.
But when I trailed along this path just a few weeks ago, I was struck by how much had changed. The shoreline remains the same, but the orange tape lining its perimeter reminds us it might not stay this way for long.
Half of Callan Park is a pristine community hub, while the other is neglected and in urgent need of repair. It appears, at least on the surface, to be an instance of conflict between the state and local government — where the latter prevails insofar as it upholds the wishes of its residents. Yet from clues in the physical landscapes to the Inner West Council’s latest murmurings, one thing remains clear: there is still a lot of work to be done, with significant obstacles at play.
Through the broken glass
As a result of its medical, social and environmental histories, Callan Park’s management is complicated by a variety of overlapping interests. Located on the traditional land of the Wangal people, Callan Park is bordered by the Parramatta River and Balmain Road. Spanning 61 hectares across Lilyfield, Rozelle and Leichhardt, the Park has been heritage-listed since 2008. Today, it is home to Writing NSW and the New South Wales Ambulance Headquarters. Until 2020, it also housed the Sydney College of the Arts. Under the Callan Park (Special Provisions Act) 2002, any commercial or profit-making activity is prohibited in the area.
The Park’s history is one of settler-colonial dispossession. Initially composed of 300 acres operated under the combined land grants of just four elite colonial businessmen, the Park was a hub for Balmain social life during the 1840s. When major shareholder and Police Magistrate Ryan Brenan declared bankruptcy in 1864, the estate’s two main residences Garry Owen House and Broughton Hall became the focus of an auction to subdivide the Park into a new waterfront suburb by 1873.
It was only through this subdivision that the Colonial Government of New South Wales purchased the Callan Park site and initiated plans to build an asylum for the mentally unwell on its grounds. Broughton Hall, alongside twenty other neoclassical buildings, were repurposed in 1885 as part of the Kirkbride Complex. Additional facilities were built during World War I, and the entire block continued to provide care, treatment and housing for patients until 1994.
Consequently, attempts to ‘redevelop’ Callan Park have long centred on delicately balancing its recreational uses with its official capacities. Indeed, the latest round of restoration blueprints were initiated almost 15 years ago. In 2011, the Leichhardt Council (since amalgamated to the Inner West Council) approved the Callan Park Master Plan to delegate the site’s management to an independent Trust, preserve “open space and heritage”, provide “active and passive recreation space”, and develop “health, community and education facilities.”
Crucially, the Plan also stipulated the demolition of thirty-nine intrusive buildings and structures. There was no timeline established for these changes.
Hands on — and off — Callan Park
At first, the Master Plan seemed to be an efficient and palatable route for redevelopment. In 2015, it was approved by the New South Wales Parliament targets to establish a specialised trust and delegate longer-term funding to the project. But six years later, the NSW Government endorsed changes to the Callan Park (Special Provisions) Act 2002 through the Greater Sydney Parklands Trust Bill 2021. The Bill, impacting other locations including Centennial Park, aimed to codify a single “super trust” to manage all parkland estates across the state.
Given that Callan Park is owned and managed by the NSW Government, the Bill placed the Inner West Council and its residents in direct opposition to state orders.
In response, the Inner West Council submitted a Draft Exposure Bill at the end of October 2021. Following extensive community consultation and a grassroots Hands Off Callan Park campaign, the Draft Exposure Bill successfully implored the NSW Government to “make no changes to the Callan Park (Special Provisions) Act 2002, commit to no future commercial uses, oppose 50-year leases, and establish the Callan Park and Broughton Hall Trust.”
Polemics in the Park
On the one hand, disagreement between the state and local government meant that the Bill was passed with amendments made by national Greens MP for Balmain Jamie Parker to protect greenspace, establish a separate Trust and keep leases down to ten years. However, the effects of this conflict are continuously felt within the redevelopment’s lethargy and incapacity to withstand smaller disputes.
Shortly after the Council’s submission of the Master Plan, Inner West Mayor Darcy Byrne went on the record to state that Callan Park was “still facing demolition by neglect.” When I reached out to the office of state Greens MP for Balmain Kobi Shetty, her team pointed me towards a recent press statement she had made in June concerning a new Callan Park Plan of Management. In particular, Shetty pointed out the need for “clear identification of which buildings will or will not be restored, the likely costs and timeframes involved, and what community uses they might then be put to.”
Of course, these issues have not completely stifled smaller redevelopment projects. In the middle of this year, Darcy Byrne confirmed that the Inner West Council had approved proposals to build Tidal Baths on the Iron Cove side of Callan Park. Upgrades to the Waterfront Green also began in January of 2021, and Building 497 will soon be open to the public as a new sports clubhouse and community space.
However, the latest controversy revolves around plans from Labor councillors to install synthetic turf on two of Callan Park’s largest fields. With an anticipated cost of $8 million and significant community concern that these materials can reach temperatures twice as hot as grass during summer months, Shetty recently stated that using “synthetic playing fields as a solution to the poor management of natural playing surfaces in our area is not a decision we should rush to.” While the Council is not due to vote on the matter until its August meeting, community groups such as Friends of Callan Park have already become key campaigners against this decision.
When I spoke to this community organisation about their broader concerns over the current and future phases of redevelopment, they told me that “proper parkland funding” is necessary to “resolve some of the rapidly increasing traffic issues and long overdue maintenance of buildings in Callan Park.” They noted that “funding for a proper traffic management plan and car park”, more “picnic tables, shade and benches”, as well as “public access and care for Kirkbride” are of a higher priority than “five or six toilets in a million plus dollar structure.”
Above all, the work completed by Friends of Callan Park highlights the enduring drive and success of community engagement within local heritage and land projects. Its members pointed out their capacity to deploy “150 corflutes” and “15,000 leaflets” during the Hands Off Callan Park campaign, as well as its ongoing attention to residents’ calls for “modern mental health services” across the Park’s buildings. As the organisation itself puts it: “Without community energy, focus and time Callan Park would not exist as it does as a place for all. The community and Friends of Callan Park have had a huge impact on how Callan Park is today.”
Conclusion
Callan Park’s redevelopment undoubtedly needs an overhaul — not only within its vision for the physical landscape, but in the way it handles, adapts and harnesses community interests. Nonetheless, I would be lying if I pretended not to love exploring its vandalised sandstone mazes across from spectacular waterside views. The Park’s character, alongside the meanings each person who works, plays and exercises upon its paths makes for themselves, must be held at the forefront of any new proposals approved by the NSW Government. Otherwise, we risk letting the ghosts of the past haunt our future.
