Case Studies
Wodonga’s CBA Revitalisation Project
Design Feature
Type of project
Local Government Initiative
State
Victoria
Location
Regional
Albury Wodonga is one of Australia’s 20 largest cities, and services a regional catchment of some 175,000 people. Following the relocation of the Wodonga Railway Station and removal of the railway line from the city centre, the Central Business Area (CBA) Revitalisation Plan has been developed to provide a vision for how the city centre could grow over the next 20 years. The Plan provides an integrated approach to developing the CBA as a vibrant and diverse pedestrian orientated, mixed-use higher density activity centre.
A vision for growth
The City of Wodonga has long recognised the importance of the revitalisation of the city centre to drive Wodonga’s economic growth and fostering community spirit by creating a city heart with a sense of place. The Wodonga CBA Revitalisation Plan and companion document the CBA Revitalisation Design Guide seek to recast Wodonga’s CBA as a magnetic people place, with spaces and places that are animated by highly interactive spaces, a rich tapestry of cultural and community events and an intensive mix of shopping, living and workplaces.
The Plan takes an integrated approach to the city’s revitalisation with an extensive implementation plan to create a city centre which invites ‘more people, more often, for more reasons’. The Plan identifies a new CBA Heart and Frame; with the Heart to bring people together in a central hub defined by three key precincts.
The Heart will provide accessible and attractive spaces with core retail activity where residents and visitors will undertake many different types of activities that create economic and social vibrancy and vitality. In addition, the Heart will include business, commercial, community and leisure activities as well as higher density residential living.
The Frame transitions from the Heart to the existing low-rise residential and broader commercial and light industrial uses that form the outer ring of the CBA. The Frame supports the Heart by carrying links to regional green spaces, walking and bike pathways.
Connectedness is a key principle of the revitalisation; with a CBA modal hierarchy, which prioritises pedestrians and cyclists above the motor vehicle to allow people to move with ease through and to multiple destinations within the CBA. Urban design and sustainability improvements will facilitate a more comfortable, climatically responsive and attractive environment. These elements together with the mix of uses will ensure people spend time in the CBA and return often. A CBA urban framework has been carefully designed to deliver certainty for investment and a revitalised CBA, by providing a new approach to integrating economic activities (existing and new), community activities, vehicular transport, walking, and cycling.
The Frame transitions from the Heart to the existing low-rise residential and broader commercial and light industrial uses that form the outer ring of the CBA. The Frame supports the Heart by carrying links to regional green spaces, walking and bike pathways.
Connectedness is a key principle of the revitalisation; with a CBA modal hierarchy, which prioritises pedestrians and cyclists above the motor vehicle to allow people to move with ease through and to multiple destinations within the CBA. Urban design and sustainability improvements will facilitate a more comfortable, climatically responsive and attractive environment. These elements together with the mix of uses will ensure people spend time in the CBA and return often. A CBA urban framework has been carefully designed to deliver certainty for investment and a revitalised CBA, by providing a new approach to integrating economic activities (existing and new), community activities, vehicular transport, walking, and cycling.
Project team
- The People for Places & Spaces
- Architectus
- GTA Consultants
- NOUS Group
- City of Wodonga
Project Cost
Approximately $150,000
Health Value
- Wodonga’s CBA will promote a healthy and safe built environment by:
- Creating a pedestrian and cyclist-oriented environment throughout the CBA with an extensive active transport network and priority areas which facilitate safe, pleasant and easy pedestrian and cycle journeys.
- Strengthen pedestrian and cycle links between the CBA and surrounding residential areas to improve walking and cycling as safe and attractive modes of transport; linking with adjacent green spaces and existing shared paths such as Belvoir Park and Sumsion Gardens and the House Creek trail for recreation purposes.
- Design and construct a public realm that adapts to a road user hierarchy which prioritises pedestrians and cyclists.
- Create public transport facilities that support accessibility to the CBA.
- Create a CBA that is safe and enjoyable to use at night through appropriate street lighting and festive and artistic feature lighting to support a night time economy.
Economic Value
- The CBA heart will provide accessible and attractive spaces where residents and visitors will undertake many different types of activities that create economic and social vibrancy and vitality.
- Wodonga’s local economy will be strengthened by:
- Creating a compact and higher built form; encouraging four to six stories in the CBA Heart and transitioning to two to three stories in the CBA Frame
- Addressing buildings to the street edge and sleeving car parking behind buildings within the three core retail activity precincts to promote a walkable city centre.
- Facilitating a mix of retail, residential, commercial, cultural, community and institutional uses in the CBA Heart.
- Strengthening the integration of proposed key developments sites Junction Place, Mann’s Central and CBD West to maximise their economic benefits ensuring these developments capture the projected 75 per cent of the current retail leakage to Albury.
- Encouraging higher density residential development in the CBA at a minimum of 30 to 40 dwellings per hectare to increase the inner city residential population and promote the long term economic sustainability of the CBA.
- Concentrating interactive building frontages along streets, lanes and public spaces in the defined retail core area and facilitate ‘micro retail’ at laneway entries.
- Encourage high quality tourist accommodation.
Environmental Value
- Wodonga will facilitate a more sustainable and climatically responsive CBA by:
- Creating a centre where landscape is omnipresent; developing the character of a ‘city in landscape’.
- Ensuring that the future buildings and landscape in the CBA Heart are designed to be climatically responsive; shading areas that are exposed to western sun and providing deciduous species where winter sunlight is desirable and deep canopy trees where shade is desirable.
- Creating green links to parks and maintaining views to the surrounding hills along key streets.
- Implementing environmentally sustainable design throughout the CBA through energy, water and waste efficiency measures which minimise resource consumption.
- Maximising higher density residential development to make more efficient use of land with convenient access to transport, commercial, community services and amenities.
- Encouraging, or mandating, that new buildings meet existing environmental accreditation systems such as Green Star or Enviro-development.
- Adopting accreditation systems will enhance Wodonga CBA’s overall environmental performance and its reputation as an environmentally aware, progressive and contemporary centre.
Social Value
- Social Value Wodonga will foster community spirit by:
- Creating a CBA which welcomes people of all abilities including children and families, young people, singles, older people and people from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds.
- Creating friendly public places throughout, including three key public spaces at the CBA’s three corners, forming gateways to the CBA.
- Providing a variety of public domain stages on which to support, celebrate and grow year-round social, arts, cultural and community activities.
- Revitalising public domain and social spaces which will attract people of all ages and abilities to participate in community activities and events — whether locals or visitors and tourists.
- Create a more socially inclusive city centre by improving and extending the active linkages to the CBA.
Use Value
- The CBA will be redeveloped as a vibrant and diverse pedestrian orientated, mixed-use higher density activity centre. The CBA heart will provide accessible and attractive spaces where residents and visitors will undertake many different types of activities that create economic and social vibrancy and vitality, including:
- A newly activated mixed use CBA Heart for the Wodonga CBA, incorporating intensive retail, commercial, business and future new tourist accommodation and residential developments. Expansion of Wodonga’s retail sector, including the development of a niche quality offering.
- Diversification of the economic base through education and training, business and visitor accommodation, cultural and recreation, entertainment and hospitality, specialist medical services and residential opportunities.
- Promote increased community, health, education and leisure activities that provide multiple reasons for locals and visitors to spend time in the CBA and to return often.
- Active streets can be achieved by maximising the variety of uses and activities that occur on them.
- Higher density residential development with the aim to increase the inner-city residential population to support the businesses in the CBA, including the shops, cafes and restaurants to increase economic vitality of the CBA.
- A mix of residential, commercial, institutional and community uses in the CBA Frame.
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