Project: Southern Parklands Design Framework
Organisation: Western Sydney Parklands Trust
Place: Western Sydney
Year: 2018–2019 (Stage 1)
Project Type: Culture-led Placemaking, Strategy, Policy & Research
City People supplied arts and cultural strategy and advice to Western Sydney Parklands Trust and the multidisciplinary design team who are delivering the strategic land-use framework for the Southern Parklands and a 5-year implementation plan for capital works and detailed design.
In order to develop the arts and cultural direction, City People engaged widely with key stakeholders including local government, internal state government, local aboriginal communities as well as best practice arts industry stakeholders. City People managed these stakeholders with clear communication and issues reconciliation right throughout the strategy development process and beyond.
Outcomes:
- Although contracted to WSPT, City People developed the arts / cultural strategy for the Southern Parklands by working in close collaboration with Tyrrell Studio who was delivering the design framework. This ensured that the cultural principles were embedded into the spatial and land-use design of infrastructure / capital projects. This was an innovative approach because arts and cultural strategy is often dealing with intangible and ephemeral practices that may or may not have capital infrastructure attached to them.
- As well as leading the project’s stakeholder development and management for the cultural /artistic direction of the park, City People brokered some significant stakeholder relations with local Aboriginal community members. The park is the largest body of natural ‘country’ in Western Sydney which is home to Australia’s largest Aboriginal population and so it was logical that City People chose “First Peoples First” as their first priority principle for the park’s cultural direction.
This project won the Australian Institute of Landscape Architects (AILA) Award of Excellence (Parks and Open Space) in 2019.
Read the summary of the Design Framework here: Western Sydney Parklands – Southern Parklands Framework
