Brisbane City Council
Ashgrove, Queensland
2019-2022
$3 million
Architecture
Landscape Architecture
Urban Design
Suburban renewal
Urban precinct revitalisation enhances amenity, connection and safety
The Ashgrove West Village Precinct Project has delivered an intimate, character rich "Village Destination" stitching together the sunny and shady sides of the street of an inner urban neighbourhood, long severed by a major arterial roadway.
The Village Revitalisation's conceptual focus was delivering “people places”, re-establishing a village feel, and injecting vitality through an enhanced public transit experience, high urban amenity, and curated artwork. The Revitalisation “reclaims the street" by narrowing traffic lanes, designing-out traffic islands, and consolidating high-voltage overhead lines to realise wider tree lined pedestrian pathways, inviting multi-use plazas, an integrated distinctive bus shelter and vibrant artwork acknowledging and amplifying local character and history.
Enabled by the Village Precinct Projects (VPP) program and borne from close community consultation, the Revitalisation delivers a suite of flexible public places rich with public art (Crows Ash Pods’ by Cezary Stulgis), shelter, furniture, and subtropical dappled shade creating ephemeral pavement and built form textures. The art adds to the local story and sense of place whilst the extensive tree planting offers welcome shade in a previously exposed, unprotected streetscape.
The new bus shelter design forms the hero of the wider village revitalisation. The striking form seeks to acknowledge and amplify the local character and history of the site. Drawing parallels with the simple and elegant forms of Brisbane’s inner-suburban heritage shelters, the bus shelter strikes a balance between the local architectural character and the eclectic urban context. The shelter’s detailing, textures, materials, and form are inspired by the Sugar Cane Arcade and Art Deco Montvue buildings, delivering a contemporary twist on a classic form that is memorable and unique to Brisbane.
Providing a robust, low maintenance form that seeks to provide both transport and visual amenity, the high-quality of finishes and detailing culminate in a landmark destination, providing shelter for the community while offering seating for the surrounding tenancies.
The open form encourages fluid pedestrian movement, whilst maintaining the pragmatics of vehicular and pedestrian sightlines.
What were the challenges?
- Developing a streetscape design with high amenity along an arterial roadway with immense overhead and underground services constraints.
- Uniting the disparate built form along the streetscape and moderating the visual impact of HV overhead wires and significant signage clutter.
- Achieving equitable access throughout the streetscape and overcoming drainage challenges resultant from ridge position and no existing in-ground drainage.
- Improving the streetscape amenity and moderating the impact of the western sun.
What were our solutions?
- Consolidating lane widths to achieve wider equitable footpaths with planting.
- Relocating and consolidating overhead lines and poles to significantly reduce their visual impact and allow for unconstrained tree planting.
- Developing and achieving approval a bespoke bus shelter reflecting the local cultural heritage.
- Integrating artwork opportunities within the streetscape.
- Integrating Disability Parking within the streetscape
How did we add value?
The Ashgrove West Village Precinct Project carefully balanced capital and operational costs through durable material selections, simplified detailing and robust low maintenance built form arrangements.
Fundamental to creating places for people was recasting the streetscape to find a higher amenity balance between pedestrians, cyclists, private vehicles and public transport. To improve the modal equity and the quality of the public transit environment, the design team reclaimed 15% of the vehicle pavement and translated this into a 35% wider footpath that allowed the scale and amenity of the existing "standard" bus shelter to be reconsidered.
The Revitalisation delivers a dramatic improvement in canopy coverage coupled with the 64qm of new bus shelter, the project will deliver a projected uplift of 660sqm of natural tree canopy shade by 2027, a valuable commodity in our warming neighbourhoods.
“BCC are delighted with the outcome; people are dwelling longer in the streetscape, venues are busy, and the tactile qualities of the shelter and streetscape invite meaningful engagement that is regularly observed.”
