A FORMER chair of the WA Planning Commission has criticised the design of a six-storey hotel planned for the Spicer site in the heart of Fremantle.

Jeremy Dawkins is one of Australia’s most distinguished urban planners, having developed national planning models, taught in a swag of Australian universities and sat on dozens of boards and commissions.

These days he lives in Sydney, but has always had a soft spot for Fremantle where he was the council’s planning boss during the heady days of the America’s Cup.

Mr Dawkins, who wrote the development policy for the Spicer site at that time, says the proposal from mining magnate Andrew Forrest’s company Fiveight is “highly conspicuous, somewhat aggressive”.

Saying the “owner and architects don’t seem to get it”, Mr Dawkins warns that 

“overscaled” developments such as the one proposed will diminish the core values of the city.