Artist's impression

The latest news from City of Greater Geelong on the Lara Town Centre Expansion project:

• Lara Town Centre Expansion Project Update 3 April 2010 (PDF – 505KB)

There was also some more info in the email that accompanied this PDF:

Hi Kayne,

I have attached the latest project update and I will add your contact details for future updates that distributed via email.

We have significantly progressed key components of the project in recent months, especially in relation to support from State Government for initiating an expressions of interest (EOI) process while concurrently working to resolve native title. We anticipate being in a position to take the project to the market via an EOI process in the coming months.

Council has also sought authorisation from the Department of Planning and Community Development to exhibit a planning scheme amendment to rezone the expansion site to Business 1 Zone and apply a Design and Development Overlay.

The local member for Lara, Mr John Eren, has continued to support the project and has been very helpful in getting these processes moving through State Government.
Regards,

Sarah Storen
Senior Strategic Planner
Planning Strategy
City of Greater Geelong
PO Box 104, Geelong, VIC, 3220
Phone: 5272 4814
Fax: 5272 4855

After upgrading my phone to an HTC Desire, I quickly realised – after eating through 100MB in a weekend – that my 250MB mobile internet plan with Three mobile was not enough!

I decided yesterday to call Three (133 320) to see what upgrades they had to offer. Whilst on hold, I found Three’s mobile internet plans, listing the plans and prices they offer.

After finally getting through to an operator, I requested to sign up for 12 months to take advantage of doubling my data to 500MB. The helpful person at Three informed me that this would cost $4 a month.

“$4 – shouldn’t that be $8!?”. I was then told that there was a special offer – signing up for 12 months meant double the data, at half the price. I then asked about the $20/1GB plan, and sure enough, I was able to sign up for 2GB for just $10 a month – an eight fold increase on my original quota, for only $2 more. It was a no brainer, and I now have 2GB of data a month.

Today I called Three again to switch to the $4/500MB plan for 12 months on my partner’s phone. During activation I was informed that the “half price/double data” offer ends on the 15th May 2010, so if you are interested, get in quick!

12 month contract? If you break the 12 month contract, there is a $35 fee. Also for the first month you have to pay the full monthly price, pro rata over your billing cycle (i.e if you are half way through your billing cycle and sign up for $20/2GB, you get 1GB for $10, and then 2GB (double) for $10 (half) each month after).

The HTC Desire was released in Australia on the 27th April 2010 by Telstra, who unfortunately have a six month exclusivity deal with HTC.

Not wanting to leave my current provider (3) or plan, I decided it was best to import the Desire from the UK. I chose Clove Technology, paid considerably less than what Telstra offer the phone for outright (which is $779), and it arrived in three business days.

Import caveat – the phone released in the UK is the “European” version, and has one small technical specification difference – the European version works on the 900MHz or 2100MHz HSPA/WCDMA network, not the 850Mhz UTMS network that Telstra’s NextG uses.

In short, if you are using a European Desire on 3, you will not be able to use the “3G Roaming Zone” outside of the “Broadband Zone” (you will roam onto Telstra’s GSM network – the “Talk & Messaging Zone”). See 3′s roaming information for more details. The phone is also compatible with Optus and Vodaphone networks.

And if you are still worried about the European version on the Australian 3 network – I have had no problems on both the 3 network or roaming outside of the 3 network. When roaming I could still read email, surf the internet, and make calls. I was also able to easily connect to Planet 3 using 3′s APN settings.

Setup was easy – when you power on the Desire for the first time, you pop in your Google account credentials, and it syncs your contacts and email to the phone. Twitter, flickr, Facebook and other service accounts can also be added.

The first feature of the Desire that made me realise what I was missing out on was WiFi connectivity. Whilst this has become standard with a lot of phones now, it’s ‘newness’ (in my mind) really stood out! Checking the news each morning on my phone no longer counts on my mobile phone bill, rather my home ADSL bill, which is much cheaper.

Navigating around the Desire’s menus and functions with your finger is very easy, and everything is very crisp and bright on the 3.7 inch AMOLED touch screen. Menus and programs load fast, and there doesn’t appear to be any noticeable lag.

The battery life so far has been fine. I have been able to get away with charging it for a few hours (2 to 3) each night, however I have not yet tested how long it will last without a charge. My feeling (based on battery drain) is about 2 days worth of charge, depending on how much you use the phone.

Tethering to my laptop was an absolute breeze too. I plugged the Desire into the laptop over USB, selected “Internet sharing” on the menu that popped up on the Desire, and the laptop (Ubuntu 10.04) automatically connected to the internet. It was that simple.

Downloading and installing apps from the Android Market is very easy, the only hard part is choosing which apps are worthy of downloading! The star rating and the number of downloads helps in this regard though. So far I have downloaded ConnectBot (an SSH client) and Bubble (a spirit level), as well as a few free games to try out.

In a nut shell – the HTC Desire has changed my phone world. It feeds me my email and twitter (rather than me asking the old Nokia for it), and makes browsing the web something I want to do, not need to do. The on-screen keyboard is easy to use (especially with auto-correction of typos), and the little things like WiFi, SMS message threading and the weather made me realise what I was missing out on.

If you are looking for a new phone, I would highly recommend the HTC Desire.

• HTC Desire at htc.com
• HTC Desire at Clove Technology – £330GBP

Specifications
Screen: 3.7-inch 480×800 AMOLED touchscreen
Camera: 5 Megapixel autofocus with LED flash
Operating system: Android 2.1
Input: Dual-touch with HTC Sense interface
CPU: Qualcomm QSD 8250 (Snapdragon), 1 Ghz
Memory: 512 MB flash, 576 MB RAM
Memory card: 32 GB microSD (Maximum, mine arrived with a 4GB card)
Connectivity: Europe/Asia Pacific: HSPA/WCDMA: 900/2100 MHz; UMTS 850 Mhz (Telstra Australia); GSM: 850/900/1800/1900 MHz; Wi-Fi (802.11b/g); Bluetooth 2.1 with EDR;
Battery: Li-ion 1400mAh
Physical size: 119 (4.7) x 60 (2.36) x 11.9 (0.47) mm (inch)
Weight: 135 g (4.8 oz)
Form factor:Candybar smartphone
Other: Proximity sensor, FM Radio, Facebook, Twitter, MS Exchange, compass, GPS, A-GPS, Google turn-by-turn navigation, Flash 10.1 enabled

2009 is well and truly over, and after countless number of electricity meter reads, I have finally collated the results and have them ready to present.

Firstly – some background on my usage. For the first eight months of 2009, my electricity usage was 14.88 kwh/day:

Now for the final four ‘challenge’ months – September to December. I will preface the result with “I tried really hard”, but unfortunately i did not succeed. My average usage for this period was 12.62 kwh/day:

So close! Under 12 would have been nice, but it is something to work towards. I will report back soon on my usage for the first quarter of this year (a.k.a the “air conditioner” quarter), to see if I can achieve the target.

I also think I need to take a new approach to reducing my usage. The odd light change to CFL or sleep period for the laptop will not achieve the “less than 12″ target. I need to do something about the always on/big consumers – the fridge, the freezer, the web server or the media center PC. One of these boys has to undergo a big change!

I am also putting together a energy meter, to allow me to monitor my usage better (rather than relying on myself to read the meter!). So far I have a CT clamp and I am working on a solution that involves a PICAXE (or an arduino) and an 433Mhz RF transmitter. More on this soon.

Water level graph - February 11 2010

Over the last few months I have prototyped and built a water tank level sensor for my 9000L rain water tank.

The design is based entirely on Silicon Chip’s PIC-Based Water-Tank Level Meter, but instead of programming PICs, I prototyped using an arduino, and built the final version using PICAXE microcontrollers.

The sensor consists of two components, each housed separately and joined by shielded cable.

Pressure sensor
An MPX-2010DP silicon pressure sensor (temperature compensated and calibrated) is mounted inside a small project case, and screwed directly to the water outlet of the tank. Water from the tank enters in via a 12.5mm threaded nipple, which is reduced to 3mm plastic tube connected to the pressure sensor.

Air remains in the 3mm plastic tube, and is pressurised by the water coming in from the tank. The more water in the tank, the more force that is placed on the air in the tube, increasing the pressure which is read by the second component of the sensor, the sensor circuitry.

Sensor circuitry
The sensor circuitry consists of a 1.5V to 5V voltage step up circuit, an instrumentation amplifier to read the pressure sensor, a PICAXE microcontroller to convert the analog signal from the pressure sensor to a digital reading, and a 433MHz RF transmitter to transmit the water level and battery voltage to a remote base station and computer.

Apart from the use of an 18X PICAXE microcontroller, the circuit is essentially the same as the “Telemetry” version of the Silicon Chip project (schematic). I also left out the BCD switches as I only have one tank which negates the need for them, as well as the three-colour LED.

The 1.5V rechargeable battery is kept charged by a small solar panel.

The transmitted water level and battery voltage is received and displayed on an indoor base station, as well as being received by another RF receiver and 08M PICAXE built on a breadboard and connected to a PC, which stores the level in a database for displaying the water level on the web.

Base station
Again, the design has been based on the Silicon Chip project and the third part of their article, however the circuit was something I put together with an 18X PICAXE. I also used a “white on black” backlit LCD display, and interfaced it to the PICAXE using this PICAXE LCD interfacing guide.

My base station does not have four buttons like Silicon Chip’s, however they were not required as I only plan on reading data from one tank, and have no need to control pumps.

PC interface
The simplest part of the whole project! An 08M PICAXE reads the incoming water level and cell voltage from an RF receiver, and transmits the values out over the PICAXE serial download cable for the PC to record. There is also an LED that flashes when data is received.

If you are wondering why I used PICAXE microcontrollers, I can explain in two brief sentences. The straight forward answer is because of their ease to program, compared to a PIC. The long winded answer is ‘evolution’ – I started this project using an arduino to read the pressure sensor, then I wanted to go wireless, then I realised an arduino was overkill for one ADC conversion, plus I don’t have a PIC programmer, etc, etc.

PICAXE sketches

• Tank level sensor, PICAXE 18X
• tank-receiver-lcd
• tank-receiver

References and related links

• Silicon Chip’s PIC-Based Water-Tank Level Meter
• MPX2010 differential pressure sensor
• PICAXE microcontrollers
• Instrumentation amplifier on wikipedia
• Practical Arduino Water tank depth sensor

In the end all it took was a week of analysing the RF signal from the weather station using my soundcard and wasting countless hours decoding the packets! And a little determination.

Receiving the signal is pretty straight forward – an RF receiver is connected to pin 8 of the arduino via a 1k resistor, and an LED via a 330ohm resistor to pin 6. See the Practical Arduino schematic for more info – it is essentially the same circuit, just minus the LED on pin 7.

You can also take a look at the ThermorWeatherRx Protoshield I soldered up after the recent SparkFun freeday.

I have uploaded the sketch to github: http://github.com/kayno/ThermorWeatherRx for anyone else to try. There is a small to-do list for me to complete, but that can happen later.

Arduino weather station receiver

Based entirely on the Practical Arduino Weather Station Receiver project, I have created my first arduino shield.

I have a BIOS/Thermor DG950R weather station (purchased from Jaycar), and whilst the Practical Arduino project sketch is for a La Crosse weather station, I have rewritten the Practical Arduino code to receive, decode and output the weather information from the DG950R. This allows me to capture the data, and store in a database.

Once I have finished fine tuning the sketch for the DG950R, I will upload it for all to see.

Update: A further post contains links to the sketch/code: http://kayno.net/2010/01/18/arduino-based-thermorbios-weather-station-receiver-sketch/

• High resolution image
• Practical Arduino Weather Station Receiver
• Thermor DG950 Wireless Home Weather Station Reviewed

from Kayne Richens
to councillor@geelongcity.vic.gov.au

date 12 February 2008 09:48
subject Attention: Cr Tony Ansett

Dear sir

I am a resident of Lara and have been waiting for the last two years for development to start on a new shopping center. I am sure you will agree that the current supermarket at Lara is inadequate in terms of range, and more importantly pricing, especially with recent interest rate rises and the expectation of continued rate rises.

Would you please provide me with an update on what is currently being done to get the ball rolling in making the new shopping center happen in Lara? When will we see you turning the first sod? What is the expected date of opening? What is currently being done to make this all happen?

It would also be great if you could update the people of Lara with this information. Perhaps some information could be published in the council news section of the newspaper, or even the Lara Happenings. We all pay our rates, we would all like to know!

Regards
Kayne Richens

I first received a standard acknowledgement of receipt:

from councillor councillor
to Kayne Richens
cc Tony Ansett
cc Tim Hellsten

date 12 February 2008 11:24
subject Re: Attention: Cr Tony Ansett

Dear Mr Richens,

I write to acknowledge receipt of your Email below regarding development of a new shopping centre in Lara. I have forwarded your Email to Cr Ansett and to Council’s
Co-ordinator of Projects for Planning Strategy, Tim Hellsten for the attention of his office.

Kind Regards
Christina

Office of Mayor and Councillors
City of Greater Geelong
PO Box 104
Geelong Vic 3220
Ph: (03) 5227 0893 Fax (03) 5227 0275
E-mail: councillor@geelongcity.vic.gov.au

The then councillor, Tony Ansett replied by email and called me soon after:

from Tony Ansett
to councillor councillor
to Kayne Richens
to Kay Rundle
to john.eren@parliament.vic.gov.au
cc Tony Ansett
cc Tim Hellsten

date 13 February 2008 08:44
subject RE: Attention: Cr Tony Ansett

I am more than happy to discuss please call me on 0403 xxx xxx or after hours on 5282xxxx

Regards Cr Tony Ansett

On the phone, Tony expressed his frustration in the delays, and put the blame on the state government (hence the cc of his email to John Eren, MLA). I then emailed Mr Eren:

from Kayne Richens
to john.eren@parliament.vic.gov.au
cc Tony Ansett

date 13 February 2008 10:33
subject Fwd: Attention: Cr Tony Ansett

Dear sir

I would appreciate some of your time to discuss the questions that I have raised below with Councillor Ansett. I can be contacted on 0438 xxx xxx, or I am happy to phone you or meet you in person.

Regards
Kayne Richens

To this date, I still have not received a reply from Mr Eren. I did however receive an email from Terry Demeo, Manager Planning Strategy at the Geelong Council:

from Terry Demeo to Kayne Richens
cc Tony Ansett

date 22 February 2008 08:56
subject Extended Shopping Centre for Lara Town Centre

Dear Mr Richens,

I refer to your email of the 12th of February 2008, in relation to the above.

I can advise that the City is committed to the provision of an extended shopping centre for the Lara town centre and has been working actively in attempting to deliver this as soon as possible.

The City has developed an Urban Design Framework (a plan) for how the extended shopping centre can be accommodated on a portion of Austin Park, however in order to give this land freehold title such that it can be onsold to a commercial developer to build extended shopping facilities there is an extensive process.

The City has been liaising directly with the Department of Treasury and Finance (the State agency responsible for the sale of State assets) and the responsible Minister, Minister Tim Holding with a view to the State dealing directly with private enterprise via an expressions of interest process so as to expedite the provision of an extended shopping centre for Lara.

Unfortunately the Minister advised that the State was not prepared to entertain a direct sale from the State to a private entity. He further indicated however that the State was supportive of the intent of Council in developing the site in a manner which delivered the shopping centre as quickly as possible, and further delivered some of the public amenities which would otherwise have to be funded via public sources.

To that end we therefore had a meeting with the relevant director in the Department of Treasury and Finance, and we have received verbal support for the sale of a portion of Austin Park to the City and for the City to run an expressions of interest process with the private sector to attract an appropriate developer to actually deliver the preferred outcome for this site. We are now working through the detail with the State in the form of a contract of sale and expressions of interest document. The steps in this process will therefore be as follows;

* Formal contract of sale between the State and City to be signed off.
* Expressions of interest process to be conducted to determine an appropriate developer for the subject site who will deliver the outcomes anticipated by the Council.
* Formal contract negotiations with a preferred developer.
* Having completed a formal contract the developer will then be responsible for undertaking a range of steps required in order to establish the freehold title for the subject site, these include the final resolution of any native title issues, removal of the temporary reservation as a public park on the crown land, aboriginal conservation management plan, native vegetation assessment, closure of roads, and opening of new roads, resolution of relocation of bowling club to facilitate the proposed development site and the rezoning of the site.

You will appreciate that the above steps will take some time however the Councils position is that these steps will be hastened if a private sector developer is appointed to assist in the resolution of these issues and therefore hasten the States steps and other steps required to actually make the site ready for the construction of new supermarket and specialty shops and community facilities.

I trust you will appreciate that the City is working as promptly as possible with the relevant State agencies, however we are not the master of our own destiny in that the land is crown land and controlled by the State. Mr John Eren the local member is assisting the City in its endeavors to have this land made available as quickly as possible for commercial development.

I am loath to give a specific time frame for the resolution of all these issues, however would emphasise again that the Council has developed a process in negotiation with the State which we think will deliver the quickest possible creation of title to enable the commercial development to happen and further we think that the process that we are adopting will deliver the broadest public benefits as part of this town centre development.

I note your request that the City publish something in the local Lara Happenings and Councillor Ansett has written a letter to the Lara Happenings which we hope will be published so as all those interested in Lara are then fully aware of the circumstances with the town centre development.

If you did want any further explanation in relation to this matter please do not hesitate to contact me on direct line 03 5227 0905.

Yours faithfully

Terry Demeo
Manager Planning Strategy
Phone: 52270905
E-mail tdemeo@geelongcity.vic.gov.au

Each night after work this week I have read my meter, and using these readings I have been able to calculate my daily usage, which I now present below in a pretty, interactive graph.

As you can see I got off to a great start – the first two days were below my target. However after that it all went belly up, and I am unsure why. The only explanation I have for the difference between the days is that the (electric) oven was used to cook dinner a couple of nights.

My average for this week was 14 kWh per day. Below the average on my previous bill, but 2 kWh above my target!

I have also tried again to minimise my usage this week. My laptop used to be on most of the time however it now suspends and sleeps after 1 hour of being idle, so it is off whilst I sleep and work. I have also replaced another two halogen downlights with the CFL type.

Hopefully these changes will help to bring my usage down next week, as I am running out of ideas. I really don’t want to go back to washing dishes in the sink – I like the dishwasher too much!

19.54 what? To put this into context, in 2003 the average daily usage for Victorian households was 6,398 kWh, or 17.48 kWh a day. Whilst I am certain that figure has gone up in the last five years, I imagine I am using at least (if not more than) the average daily household usage. With only two adults in my average sized home, this is excessive!

Immediately I forked out for compact fluorescent lights (CFLs) to replace my energy hungry incandescent globes. I also reshuffled some hard disk drives between two computers that were on 24/7 so that one could be shut down and only powered up when needed. The last change was to replace two of the hard disk drives in my 24/7 media centre PC with one ‘green’ hard disk drive.

These changes resulted in a welcome surprise on my next electricity bill. My average daily usage was down to 15.33 kWh – a 21% decrease. By being energy conscious (switching off lights and appliances when not needed) the third bill came in at 13.47 kWh – another 12% decrease.

It was now summer 2009 – air conditioning season. I have a split system inverter air conditioner, and I decided I would monitor my electricity usage more closely to see how much it used. On the infamous Black Saturday I consumed 24.56 kWh, and probably played my part in the blackouts that followed.

Over the next few months I monitored my usage every week or so, with my average daily usage coming in around 15 kWh. After returning from overseas in July, I decided it was time to reduce my usage even more.

Using a watt meter I checked all the appliances in my house to see what was using… errr… watt. The biggest users were my media center and web server PCs (~1.6 kWh a day each), and also the fridge in the kitchen (1 kWh a day) and the freezer in the garage (1 kWh a day).

The biggest surprise came from my study, where I have a PC and printer that is rarely used, and is shut down when not in use. I estimate that it is powered up every 3 weeks, however the standby power that it consumed whilst off was high – 40 watts or 0.96 kWh a day! It is now turned off at the power point, resulting in 0 kWh a day.

Other appliances I tested included the front loading washing machine (4 watts when switched off at the machine) and the cordless phone base station (6 watts).

The final change I am making is to replace the last of my energy hungry lighting – the eight 50 watt halogen downlights in my kitchen and dining area. In total they consume 0.4 kWh per hour, or 1.6kWh a day if they are on for four hours each night. I have had two of them replaced with CFL type downlights that consume only 11 watts each as a trial, however I am already sold and will organise to have the other six replaced ASAP.

The changes I have made in the last month have brought my usage down to around 13 kWh a day. I have set myself a target of 12kWh a day, which I think can be easily achieved, will save me money in the long run, and reduce my need for the grid.