The Dunedin City Council has ordered an engineering feasibility report on using the ground floor of the Municipal Chambers to provide extra space for the town hall.
It will join the option being considered to build an extension on to the town hall over Harrop St.
A Dunedin City Council subcommittee sat yesterday to consider the future of the project.
The proposal to extend the historic building on to Harrop St has attracted considerable opposition, and the stripping-out of the ground floor of the chambers and rebuilding option has been favoured by opponents.
Retired Dunedin architect Ted McCoy has suggested the council could use the ground floor to provide more space by including the areas occupied by the Hungry Frenchman restaurant and the Dunedin Visitor Centre.
Cr Syd Brown said at the meeting he wanted professional advice on this.
He asked Opus principal architect Jeff Thompson whether it was possible.
"The simple answer is you can do anything, but it all comes at a cost," Mr Thompson said.
It was not possible, though, to move some of the load-bearing walls, which meant some small rooms would have to stay.
"That would not be totally ideal," Mr Thompson said.
There was "a very complex problem" dealing with the varying floor levels of the building.
"Very few of them align."
Cr Richard Walls said the uncertainty about what would become of the restaurant was not good for the business.
Mr Thompson agreed with a suggestion by Mayor Peter Chin that converting the space occupied by the restaurant into a foyer would not help the Dunedin Centre's problem with a lack of break-out space.
But Mr Chin said there was both public and council interest in what could be done within the existing footprint of the building.
The subcommittee voted to have an engineering feasibility report prepared, another on the legal status of Harrop St, and the status of the designation of the street.
The two options will now be developed to plan stage, and the structural aspects of the Municipal Chambers proposal considered, along with projected costs for both.
