This award recognises a great place, street or neighbourhood. Great places have a true sense of place, cultural and historical interest, community involvement and a vision for tomorrow. A great place is one that attracts, inspires and motivates people. It has a great atmosphere. It’s a place that people are proud of. It sparks an individual sense of pride and contributes to the overall community wellbeing. It brings people together whether to eat, drink, sleep, play or work.
A great place might be a single building, a precinct or a neighbourhood.
It is awarded for a place that demonstrates a significant achievement for an area, either a single community or a geographic region, in accomplishing positive changes as a result of planning. It should demonstrate the implementation from plan to place that makes an outstanding contribution to advancing planning practice.
This award recognises achievement on the ground. It sees a plan come to life and result in a quality planning outcome. The place should be a physical place enjoyed by people and communities. Projects in rural, peri-urban and regional areas, in addition to urban areas, are encouraged to nominate.
Nominations should address the relevance of the project to one or more planning interest such as urban and regional planning, social planning, environmental planning, transport planning, urban design, economic development planning and/or planning law.
Meet the nominees:
NSW Nominee: Lindfield Village Green
Ku-ring-gai Council
Originally slated as a three-storey car park, this is now a place where the water feature enables children to splash and play while their carers mingle, the elderly sit in quiet comfort and young people engage more actively; while the cars are hidden away underground, remaining cool for their owners returning on the nearby trains. Ku-ring-gai Council were able to achieve this outcome through constructive collaboration with Transport for NSW and the ability to demonstrate a strong strategic need for well located green space.
QLD Nominee: Hanlon Park / Bur'uda
Brisbane City Council in collaboration with AECOM, Gaskell Planning, Bligh Tanner, Deicke Richards, Lat Studios, E2DesignLab, CPR Group, Tract and proudly constructed by Epoca Constructions Pty Ltd.
Hanlon Park/Bur’uda demonstrates a commitment to good planning, strong community engagement, environmental considerations, revitalisation of the precinct and enhancement of the existing urban form.
The project has completely transformed an uninviting, neglected, rundown, yet functional area. The judging panel noted that this project has been years in the making and is a credit to all those that saw the vision, delivered submissions, engaged with the community and planned for this place to be great.
TAS Nominee: The University of Tasmania - Inveresk
Ireneinc Planning and Urban Design in partnership with the University of Tasmania and their Northern Transformation project team, and the City of Launceston
The relocation of the University of Tasmania from Newnham to Inveresk was a landmark transformation in Launceston's urban landscape. The Inveresk precinct, situated 500 meters from the CBD, exemplifies how universities can spearhead urban rejuvenation, embedding sustainability, truthtelling, design excellence, heritage, and innovation at its core.
The precinct interweaves cultural and recreational sites, blending historic structures with modern educational facilities. Despite site constraints and the precinct's significant heritage value, the development managed to fuse Launceston's rich history with sustainable design and functionality.
WA Nominee: Co-designing and co-creating public places with young people
RAC, Town of Port Hedland, Shire of Trayning and Town Team Movement
From a community building project to an unexpected great place, this nomination has been able to deliver a spark of pride and a true sense of place through community involvement.
The project creates something different for the community; creating an attractive and inspiring place built from the grit and motivation of young people to give back to their neighbourhood, their families and their Elders. The project is repeatable, transferrable and develops a can-do attitude amongst those involved.