Being a Sydneysider these days, I was only dimly aware that little old Melbourne had gone and built one of the world's tallest buildings. We try to ignore such silliness (except when it's us doing it). We got used to commiserating with people who lived in Melbourne ("Melbourne! - Oh you poor thing!") We still try to tell ourselves not much could ever happen in any other Australian city.
I even turned up at the old tallest Australian building first, the Rialto south tower. I could see it had a taller cousin, but thought the view from its observation deck would be better, as it would include this new Eureka Tower too. But alas, they'd closed it a few months ago. Couldn't compete.
So it was over to the south bank and up the 300m new colossus.
It is quite impressive, and it was a very pleasant and comfortable way to spend a couple of hours away from the wind and wet and cold that Melbourne can still dish up. It's 38 seconds to the 88th floor in the fastest lift in the southern hemisphere (against 30 seconds to the third floor that I'm used to at work!) The pamphlet tells me the building weighs 200,000 tonnes, has 3680 stairs and 52,000 square metres of glass, and the glass on its top ten levels is 24 carat gold plated. The Skydeck is the highest public vantage point in the southern hemisphere. (I'm always underwhelmed by these 'southern hemisphere' claims - makes it sound unnecessarily second rate in my opinion).
I saw the toy trains of Flinders Street station, the Spirit of Tasmania docked in Port Melbourne, the sports stadiums - including the sacred MCG - just to the east, the Dandenong Ranges in the distance, and every few minutes the intrepid tourists in the glass box that trundled out into space for the 'Edge Experience'. Wasn't tempted by that one.N
