Heading out ...

Yes, Susan, Central Station (aka Sydney Terminal) is still operating as a railway station. Indeed, I think I would put it on my list of icons (just had to fix the spelling there, as my diplopia caused me to type "lust"), not just for my city of Sydney, but also for my state of New South Wales. In the affection of the hoi poloi, I suspect it would rank second after the "coat-hanger". We do, though, have a penchant for demolishing fine old buildings such as this, eg the original Stock Exchange in Bridge Street, and of showing disrespect and changing them into hotels and eateries for the well-off folk, eg the GPO (General Post Office) in Martin Place. Every two weeks, I catch a train from Central up to Gosford, about 60kms, or 90 minutes. I visit my brother in an aged-care facility. This train shown here, was the 8:15am Intercity, yesterday, Sunday. I can also take the 7:45 am City-Rail train on a Saturday, depending of how my fortnight is structured. I love to travel by train. It is soothing, and I can people-watch 'til my heart's content.

CBD Streets - Martin Place

Standing at the "top" of Martin Place close to Macquarie Street, looking into the setting sun. The topography is obvious. The building in the centre background is on George Street. It used to be a bank, but is now a Burberry.

Martin Place runs east-west between George Street and Macquarie Street, and is located about half-way between Sydney Town Hall and Circular Quay. It was created, in 1892, from a narrow lane that only ran between George and Castlereagh Streets. In 1935, Martin Place was pushed through to Macquarie Street, involving the demolition of some remarkable (but shabby-chic) terraces. Martin Place has now been a (staged) pedestrian precinct since 1971. I say staged as it is sliced (north-south) by Pitt Street, Castlereagh Street, and Elizabeth Streets. The third incarnation of the GPO (General Post Office) was opened (facing the original laneway) in 1891. There is a hefty climb from George Street up to Macquarie Street, illustrating the fact that Sydney straddles ridges (Macquarie being one of them) and gullies (George being one of those). The GPO clock tower was removed in 1942 to avoid being targeted in an air-raid. It was not replaced until 1964. The clock booms the hour.

Martin Place used to be bordered by the most imposing stand of sandstone colonial buildings one could ever hope to see. However, they are disappearing at a rate of knots. The developers say they are being remodelled. Even the GPO is not the GPO, but a hotel that none of us can afford to stay in.

Taphophile Tragics - On praising Caesar

What did Shakespeare have Mark Antony say:

I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them;
The good is oft interred with their bones.

This post is dedicated to the memory of James Barnet, who in his position of 'Colonial Architect' designed and project managed the construction of the new General Post Office in the second half of the 19th century. His was an influential position, a position which he held from 1865 until 1890, and during which he produced over 1,350 works. He listed on his retirement 169 Post and Telegraph offices, 130 Courthouses, 155 Police Stations, 110 lock ups and 20 lighthouses. During his time as Colonial Architect there were 20 separate Parliaments, 16 Ministers and nine different Premiers. . Barnet resigned as Colonial Architect on 30 June 1890. Shortly afterwards the Colonial Architect’s Department was abolished.

So why do I prevaricate? I come to praise Caesar, not to bury him - yeah, yeah, I know; that is already done. In Barnet's case, in my opinion, the good that he did lives after him, and the evil is interred with his bones. In this case, 'evil' is going to far, as any person is a product of his time. And I base my opinion of only two pieces of information. For starters, Barnet was an argumentative egotist. Yesterday, I alluded to the disagreements he had with parliament, the press, and investigators with regard to the spandels on the GPO. But he had this sort of disagreement with many of his commissions. He was nowt but a public servant, albeit a well-placed one. I figured him to be an egotist when I read that one of the heads on the GPO is his, and I include it as the final photograph here.
However, I am most aggrieved by his headstone. And yes, that may not have been his choice or his doing. But would a man of Barnet's strength leave that to his descendents? And it is not his side of the headstone to which I object. It is the obverse, the side dedicated to his wife, Amy Gosling Barnet, who departed this world in 1889, just before her 60th birthday. JJB did not die until 1904, which leads me to conclude that he had input to his wife's marker. That is her as my lead photograph, nursing her first child, Amy. JJB married Amy Gosling in Hackney, east London in July 1854 and a month later the couple sailed for New South Wales as assisted immigrants. Amy was the daughter of a builder, John Gosling, and his wife Elizabeth. The Barnets had 4 daughters and three sons, two of who also became architects. But look at Amy's epitaph.

Her name is not mentioned anywhere! Arrggghhh!!!!!

Yes, within the cameo it says Mrs Barnet. Lordy, lordy, lordy. Talk about goods and chattels ... So, am I praising him, or burying him? The good lives on, so therefore the bad should be laid to rest?

This is my contribution to the Taphophile Tragics community.

Spitting the spandrel

The spandrels in the middle arch were splendid!

A spandrel, in architecture,is the space between two arches or between an arch and a rectangular enclosure.

On the Pitt Street facade of the GPO in Martin Place, the architect, James Barnet, commissioned the Italian sculptor, Tomaso Sani, to create a series of basso-relievo in the spandrels of the arches of the ground floor arcade. Barnet wanted the carvings to show the practical side of the operation of a Post Office.

The carvings represented: Telegraph, Literature, the Press, Professions, Commerce, and Mining.

Even before they were finished, the carvings came under attack and Barnet was accused of a lack of aesthetic taste and professional judgement. A bitter debate ensued for more than seven years. The affair was an example of the type of cultural cringe that existed in colonial society in the nineteenth century.

The spandrels also represented Agriculture, Pastoral, Science, Art, Banking, and the Post Office.

It reflected the division between the elitists in all things English and the supporters of an emerging Australian culture building its own traditions. The idea that a great public building might not follow slavishly in the Classical tradition was abhorrent to some self-appointed arbiters of taste. Barnet and Sani were attacked in the press, and in the parliament. The criticism was seldom objective and often abusive. The entire kerfuffle was finally put to bed by Henry Parkes who gave the self-appointed arbiters of taste a right 'serve' in the parliament.

Today, most passersby do not even notice the carvings and would find them innocuous if they bothered to look up.

Sydney's GPO - once a facade always a facade

Here be the George Street facade of the General Post Office (GPO) whose address is No. 1 Martin Place. However, it is no longer the GPO, although there is a post office still within the building. It has been gutted and turned into a swanky hotel. You know the drill: inside all brushed aluminium, Scandinavian Ashe, and frosted glass, whilst the outside remains sandstone and marble. Good, solid, dependable stuff that indicates 'this lady's not for turning'.

And it has ever been so. What you see here is the second GPO to have graced this central CBD site. The first GPO was given a facade to hide the squalor of what was behind. A facade of a facade.

Sydney's first PO was established on 25th April 1809 on Hospital Wharf on the west of Sydney Cove, and was run by Isaac Nichols. Upon his death in 1819, George Panton became the Postmaster - as well as being the coroner. When he died in 1829, the role was taken by James Raymond who was known as the Postmaster-General. By then they had moved into part of an old police station on the site of the current GPO. By 1845 the post office had taken over the entire building and a classical portico was attached in 1848 to up the esteem of the service in the eyes of the community. Over time, the stench from the polluted Tank Stream, and from nearby stables had the workforce and the public up in arms, and the original GPO was demolished in 1863. The new GPO was opened in 1874.

The architect was James Barnet. More on him in my Taphophile Tragics post next Tuesday. Suffice it to say that he cowed to few people. He was instrumental in the highly decorative facade. Here is a taste of the George Street frontage. As well as the very French effect I showed yesterday, here is the kangaroo and the emu in shackles leading straight to the lion atop a crown. Remember, this is in 1874, and Australia was not federated as a Commonwealth until 1901. This is eerily like the Australian Coat-of-Arms.

Sydney's GPO - an exploration

Known as 'Little Brother' this clock replaced the original Angelo Tornaghi designed clock in 1878. They both preceded the more well-known Clock Tower. 'Little Brother' protrudes over George Street, and this photograph was taken from Barrack Street. This incarnation of the GPO was designed by James Barnet.

Although Barnet was smitten, the original clock dial was difficult to see from street level, and the populace despised it. Its replacement has three dials, each six feet in diameter. This George Street clock became the chief time-piece in the central city until the construction of the Clock Tower (Big Brother) in 1891.

Tank Stream (3) - The run of clear water

The main display under and along the northern wall

Shuffle respectfully around this gutted shell and you may hear the echoes of voices past - of Arthur Phillip and Watkin Tench, of Lachlan Macquarie and Simeon Lord, of Mary Reiby and Margaret Hyde. Listen for Governor Hunter outlawing the keeping of hogs beside the stream upon threat of ‘having (your) house pulled down’. Listen to Mistress Simpson in April 1803 instructing the Sydney Gazette to place her advertisement for the laundering of linen in the stream ‘for most reasonable rates’.

Left: view of the upper echelon of the rebuild Right: view of the lower echelon of the rebuild

Then layer on top the voices of the architect James Barnett and his team of masons and carpenters and iron mongers as they worked to create the vast halls and staircases of the GPO. The Sydney Morning Herald in 1887 declared that ‘its foundations descend thirty feet into the rock below the pavement line, with very strong arches over the sewer of the Tank Stream, as its flow could not be interfered with in any way.’

This is the culvert - use your imagination here!

Add the late 20th century layer of exclusive hotel, expensive boutiques, baristas and patisseries, and you have the archaeology of a city block. And underneath, encased in a myriad of culverts, flows the Tank Stream. The very reason for the site of the colony was now trapped beneath it own success.

Left: Lots of culvert styles are used this ovoid shape is just one of them Right: the main Martin Place entrance showing the proximity to the Cenotaph

Be warned – you see NO water. The stream is encased, bricked up, in a big culvert. It takes a while to digest all the diagrams, to orient the flow, to tune to the voices. The ‘Plan of Drains’ for the 1887 rebuild shows that the the entire block drains into the Tank Stream – history as effluent. The Tank Stream continues its course through Martin Place below the Cenotaph just as the diagram showed yesterday. And washes all the dirty linen of this raggle-taggle city into the same cove in which the First Fleet anchored in January 1788.

I have taken this image from the NSW Water Board site.However, click here to be taken to Daniel Boud's Tank Stream tour as shown on the Time Out Sydney website.