Sam Ralph says he felt a real sense of excitement when a sprawling green hub for his community was proposed three years ago.
“When the City Heart was introduced, I felt proud to be a Clarence resident,” he said.
The urban green belt on Hobart’s eastern shore is roughly one-and-a-half times the size of the Royal Tasmanian Botanical Gardens, and would create a network of walking paths and bike lanes that access the city’s commercial hub at Rosny.
The jewel in the crown would be activated civic spaces in the former Rosny public golf course with its sloping lawns and mature trees set on over 14.3 hectares.
But last year, Clarence City Council put consultation for the City Heart project on hold, and announced it would support a competing proposal by the Tasmanian government and the AFL to build a high-performance centre (HPC) on the site.