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Circular Quay

Opinion

The Quay to our glittering city? No, it’s a circular political graveyard

Tone Wheeler Australian Architecture Association president October 15, 2025 — 6.00pm Advertisement

Once there was a vision of Circular Quay being the major urban square of Sydney. In 1989, when Winston Barnett arrived from the UK as the new professor at the architecture school at Sydney’s University of Technology, he saw an opportunity to develop the space as a “wet piazza”.

In early 1995, the then-Liberal government held a competition to reimagine the entire area, looking for grand visions that could retain the Cahill Expressway and railway line. The winning scheme featured a giant verandah overhanging the water’s edge, with upgraded wharves. One month after congratu

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