The development now under the design guidance of Richard Rogers with developer Lend Lease, where the scheme has seen a 30% rise in floor space over the 2 years, and includes a “150m long Peninsula extending into east Darling Harbour” that will allow for views to the Sydney Opera House.

The previous competition winner Philip Thalis has labeled the new development as the “worst of Dubai”. (the history of the development is summarised in a concise blog entry on Super Colossal, if interested – http://supercolossal.ch/2010/01/13/blueprint/)

In relation to this blog, I find it quite interesting to conceive of building an island for a view – as opposed to an example of political sovereignty, this development is building onto the harbour to capture its icon. However, this is not to say the development is not without political controversy – the “state government is poised to waive planning rules so a developer can fill in part of the harbour to build the city's biggest hotel…”

And here continues the strange zone of legality for Australia in realtion to islands – the only Island Continent.

The development now under the design guidance of Richard Rogers with developer Lend Lease, where the scheme has seen a 30% rise in floor space over the 2 years, and includes a “150m long Peninsula extending into east Darling Harbour” that will allow for views to the Sydney Opera House.

The previous competition winner Philip Thalis has labeled the new development as the “worst of Dubai”. (the history of the development is summarised in a concise blog entry on Super Colossal, if interested – http://supercolossal.ch/2010/01/13/blueprint/)

In relation to this blog, I find it quite interesting to conceive of building an island for a view – as opposed to an example of political sovereignty, this development is building onto the harbour to capture its icon. However, this is not to say the development is not without political controversy – the “state government is poised to waive planning rules so a developer can fill in part of the harbour to build the city's biggest hotel…”

And here continues the strange zone of legality for Australia in realtion to islands – the only Island Continent.

It's interesting to muse on the island biogeographical dynamics on the Web. Although its ideology might wish it, the Internet is hardly immune to the formation of islands. But on the Web as in geography, no island is ever an island.

One more insular oddity that's always captured my fancy: Rome's Ponto Rotto. The bridge collapsed on both ends in (I think) the 17th century, turning it into an island. There it stands out in the Tiber, a bridge no one can walk upon, a piece of urban geography gradually wilding in sight of the bustling city on the banks.

It's interesting to muse on the island biogeographical dynamics on the Web. Although its ideology might wish it, the Internet is hardly immune to the formation of islands. But on the Web as in geography, no island is ever an island.

One more insular oddity that's always captured my fancy: Rome's Ponto Rotto. The bridge collapsed on both ends in (I think) the 17th century, turning it into an island. There it stands out in the Tiber, a bridge no one can walk upon, a piece of urban geography gradually wilding in sight of the bustling city on the banks.

According to The Age, “The Howard government removed about 4,600 islands from the migration zone in 2005, preventing boat people who land there from accessing Australian law and claiming asylum in Australia.” This includes Christmas Island, which now falls into a strange grey zone of legal sovereignty; from the perspective of an arriving immigrant, it both is and is not Australia.

So what is the political science fiction of “excised” island terrain?

I'm reminded here of China Miéville's novel The City & The City, in which differently controlled but spatially overlapping urban territories have been marbled into and through one another; you can physically stand in two cities at once, yet only legally be present in one at any given time.

Now blow that strange in-and-out status up to the scale of a South Pacific archipelago and you have something approximating the spatial logic of Australian territorial law as applied to commonly used immigration routes.