Scenario Two Returns: A People’s Stadium for Tasmania
By Dr Emily Samuels-Ballantyne | Dr Demeter
When I wrote Scenario Two: Powering Regeneration earlier this year, it was because Tasmania was being asked to accept yet another top-down mega-project with minimal public conversation, an energy scheme shaped by distant corporate priorities rather than community wellbeing. Today, I find myself writing Scenario Two again, yet it is an entirely different sector. However it is the same pattern, same bulldozer and same old ideology dressed up as “progress”. This time, the megaproject is the stadium.
Tasmanian’s are being asked to accept a pre-determined, corporate-driven urban development whose rationale has been shaped almost entirely by the AFL’s commercial ambitions. A homogenous, trickle-down economic narrative, so thin in ethics that even Margaret Thatcher might have raised an eyebrow. And yet, as with energy policy, the question is not “stadium or no stadium.” The real question is: what kind of place-making do Tasmanians deserve? And why aren’t we being asked?
The Pattern We Keep Repeating…
The stadium process has followed the same architecture as every “Scenario One” before it:
A corporate body sets the narrative,
Government adopts it with enthusiasm
Community consultation becomes an afterthought
Design imagination is replaced by project management
Public money is committed before public interest is defined.
The wider social, cultural, ecological and health impacts are never modeled.
Tasmania deserves better than this endless cycle of homogeneous megaprojects, projects that rarely consider the everyday life of communities, the value of local sports, or the deep cultural and ecological relationships inherent to place. We’ve seen this with Battery of the Nation and now we’re seeing it again with the stadium. Tasmania is being offered another Scenario One and we already know how that story ends.
Scenario Two: The People’s Stadium Precinct
If a stadium is to be built and public funds invested then Tasmanian’s deserve a Scenario Two: a community-led, Country-centred vision grounded in the design principles articulated by Aboriginal architect and cultural leader Alison Page. “Designing with Country” asks us to create not just buildings, but relationships: with land, with memory, with community, with future generations. So let us imagine a stadium precinct not as a concrete bowl for AFL alone, but as a living place of regeneration and belonging. The following scenario visions introduce a vision for the stadium based on many conversations and concerns expressed by a diverse array of Tasmanian people regarding the Stadium issue.
Scenario 1 Glenorchy: The Regenerative Heartland Precinct
In Glenorchy, the stadium precinct becomes a living pulse rather than a monument. Former industrial blocks are transformed into multi-sport courts, food gardens, youth studios and shaded outdoor rooms. Glenorchy Art and Sculpture park (GASP) and the foreshore form a cultural-ecological spine linking movement, art and everyday life. Children walk safely after school to badminton, fencing, footy, swimming or dance; seniors enjoy gentle circuits under native canopies; weekend markets gather families across cultures. Glenorchy becomes the bold statement: investment flowing to the communities who actually need it. Instead of concentrating wealth and traffic in the CBD, this precinct regenerates the North, honours working-class heritage, and creates a vibrant, inclusive urban commons.
Scenario 2 Bridgewater & Gagebrook: Justice Through Design
Here, the stadium becomes a declaration that Tasmania invests in people long excluded from major public projects. The precinct is designed through genuine partnership with local First Nations community leaders, youth groups and elders. Safe movement paths link homes to multi-sport courts, gardens, food hubs, a community pool and a cultural pavilion shaped with Country’s stories. Youth employment, cultural training, small businesses and creative workshops arise around the precinct. Bridgewater/Gagebrook welcomes investment that heals and uplifts. This becomes a national model for design-led justice: building infrastructure where it transforms lives, not where it benefits corporate stakeholders and elite visitors.
Scenario 3 Shorewell Park (NW Tasmania): A Statewide Anchor
A stadium in Shorewell Park becomes a powerful decentralising gesture, recognising that Tasmania is more than its capital. The precinct integrates nature trails, multi-sport facilities, youth arts spaces and edible terraces overlooking the hills. Regional families gain access without needing to drive to Hobart; local employment, agriculture, hospitality and arts benefit directly. Small shops return; gardens bloom; pathways connect residents to daily activity and pride. This scenario lifts the North-West with dignity, countering decades of underinvestment. Instead of reinforcing Hobart’s gravitational pull, the state invests in regional strength. Shorewell Park becomes a humane, inclusive anchor for wellbeing, creativity and community identity, something a CBD-focused stadium cannot offer.
Scenario 4 Risdon Vale: Healing & Country-Led Place-Making
In Risdon Vale, the precinct becomes a sanctuary shaped by Country wisdom and ecological care. Bushland edges guide design: open-air pavilions, walking loops, communal gardens and cultural learning spaces honour palawa presence. A modest, community-friendly stadium nestles into landscape contours rather than overwhelming them. Residents gain access to diverse sports, creative studios, food programs and wellbeing spaces that foster healing after generational challenges. Unlike Hobart’s dense, CBD, Risdon Vale has space to grow something gentle, sustainable and intergenerational. Here, the stadium becomes less an arena and more a regenerative village: a place where community, Country and daily life meet in balance.
Scenario 5 Outer Hobart Retrofit: The Sustainable Transition Stadium
On Hobart’s outskirts, an existing structure which is an older stadium venue is retrofitted into a lean, ecological stadium. This saves hundreds of millions in construction costs, redirecting funds into youth wellbeing programs: free sports access, fresh food programs, theatre, music, library expansion and First nations language initiatives. Solar roofs, rain gardens, recycled materials and public transport hubs turn the precinct into a climate-positive model. Retrofitting avoids demolition waste, CBD congestion and high-carbon new-build impacts. Instead of pouring public money into a prestige project, Tasmania invests in people. The stadium becomes the symbolic anchor, while wellbeing, learning and creativity become the true legacy of this courageous Scenario Two.
Scenario 6 First Nations-Led Economic Regeneration Precinct (Vision Concept)
Inspired by First Nations architect Alison Page ‘New Australian Design Methodology” this scenario places First Nations leadership at the centre of design, governance and economic participation. Co-owned enterprises flourish: cultural tourism, native food businesses, landscape stewardship, arts markets, youth training programs and creative entrepreneurship. The precinct becomes a living campus of cultural learning language revival, land-care education, storytelling trails, and intergenerational gathering spaces designed with First Nations architects and knowledge holders. The stadium, in this vision, is not an extractive corporate asset but a platform for community-led innovation, job creation and cultural strength. lutruwita Tasmania becomes a global example of what sports infrastructure looks like when grounded in justice, Country, reparative economics and the intelligence of the world’s oldest continuous culture.
Scenario 7 The Wellbeing, Arts & Movement Commons (Vision Concept)
This scenario reframes the stadium precinct as a wellbeing ecosystem rather than a singular venue. Multi-sport areas, dance studios, performance stages, outdoor theatres, sensory gardens, open libraries, youth maker-spaces and quiet reflection zones form an interconnected landscape of creativity and health. Families gather for evening badminton; teens rehearse theatre under warm lights; elders read beneath native plantings; community choirs echo across the terraces. Health services, nutrition programs, arts mentoring and culture-based healing coexist seamlessly. Instead of the CBD’s commercial pressures, this commons prioritises human flourishing. It becomes a world-class demonstration that public infrastructure can nurture imagination, dignity, physical vitality and communal joy every single day of the year.
Public Money Means Public Imagination
To conclude, Tasmanian taxpayers are being asked to fund a stadium, so if that is the case, public money demands public benefit.
Where is the wellbeing modelling?
Where is the community design process?
Where is the First Nations equity framework?
Where is the analysis of daily-life value not just event-day revenue?
A stadium shaped by the AFL is not a public-interest project, but a stadium shaped by Tasmanian’s can be. Scenario Two is not anti-stadium, it is anti-homogeneity it is anti-corporate capture. Scenario 2 however is pro-community, pro-Country, and pro-equity and above all: it is pro-imagination!
Honouring the Public Imagination
Scenario Two gained traction in energy policy circles because people recognised it as a people and place centered vision with a critical naming of the deeper pattern, and a reclaiming of our democratic right to envision alternatives grounded in care, justice and community resilience. Tasmania is a proud heart shaped Island of creativity and care. If Tasmania must build a stadium, then Tasmania deserves a Scenario Two. A stadium precinct grounded in Country, shaped by community, serving diverse sports and real lives, designed for regeneration and built for the highest good of all.
