Sartor's Shaman
Robin Moore, City of Sydney Times, August 4, 1999

Sydney should have been a feng shui disaster zone because of its lack of planning but an expert in the 3000-year-old belief system says the city has a wealth of good fortune.

Its rapid and haphazard development occurred almost entirely in ignorance of ancient Chinese mystical tradition.

And fears of a backlash from bad-luck buildings and designs have been rife since many city users have embraced feng shui.

Lord Mayor Frank Sartor acknowledged community concerns by hiring feng shui master Howard Choy as a consultant to the council.

Mr Choy worked for 18 months modifying the $7 million Chinatown upgrade so it would magically promote prosperity.

Cr Sartor said: "Feng shui is a very important influence within Australian Chinese culture and it was vital to ensure it was incorporated into the designs for the upgrading of Haymarket.

"It has been considered so important, in fact, that the city undertook extensive consultations with the community, advertised the upgrading plans, employed Howard Choy and received input from several other feng shui experts to get it right."

Feng shui wisdom is based on a mysterious life force known as chi.

It is said chi can bring bad luck, sickness, peace or prosperity according to the configuration of the surrounding buildings, furnishings and landscape.

Mr Choy, an architect who has studied feng shui for more than 20 years, said even though no feng shui consideration was open to any other major city developments before his appointment the city still has good chi.

"Feng shui is very important for Sydney, some people may not realise it but feng shui can influence the character of a city and the well-being of the people living there," said Mr Choy.

"The climate, orientation, topography and Sydney's relationship to water makes the city unique.

"We have a natural harbour which is a gateway into the city, Circular Quay becomes the chi mouth for the city.

Apparently the beauty of Sydney's natural environment - which brings good chi - has, in many places, been complemented by the architecture.

"Architecture is man-made feng shui and it modifies the natural chi pattern of a place.

"The Harbour Bridge, which is the device that assembles the wealth chi, is also at the head of the Azure Dragon.

"Sydney draws its energy from water coming through the heads, the Bridge slows the chi flow and allows the wealth chi to channel into the CBD."

He said the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge were perfectly positioned for positive feng shui.

"The Opera House is very powerful because it is the head of the White Tiger.

"This acts to balance out the yin and yang force of good feng shui.

"The configuration also energises the bays along the foreshore giving places like Double Bay, Rose Bay, Rushcutters Bay, Neutral Bay and Mosman good feng shui."

But if the Bridge was constructed from Bennelong Point or the Opera House was on the left side of Circular Quay, things would have been very different.

Apparently, in the ideal feng shui model, the Azure Dragon must be on the left the White Tiger on the right with the red bird and the bright hall in the middle.

Sydney is lucky to have the hall and the bird formed by the waters of the quay.

He said the only problem comes because: "The buildings fronting on to Circular Quay tend to be too tall.

“They block the chi flow from the water into the city centre, it would have been better if these buildings could step up gradually from the waters edge southward forming a man-made back drop or protection we call the Black Turtle.

"We cannot change the height of the buildings now but the least we could do is remove the Cahill Expressway and put it underground so it would not block and choke the chi mouth of Sydney."

Cr Sartor stated his plans to remove the expressway in the recent document City on the Move.