Palmwoods Newtown Square
2018 Queensland Award of Excellence - Civic Landscape
Sunshine Coast Council
At Palmwoods New Town Square there's a lot in a small space. Sunshine Coast Council established a comprehensive engagement process that saw community capacity building taking place alongside consultation. This enabled many diverse, and often competing views to be respectfully heard, so that no one single voice dominated the outcome. The agreed values have also been sensitively translated into the built project.
The new square provides equitable access from the train station into the heart of the community: the space that has already been successfully used for community celebrations and festivals. The attention to detail is also meaningful, with local designers and craftspeople creating a range of bespoke urban furniture. The planting design incorporates signature species from the region, but also references local residential garden palettes. This thoughtful, multi-layered approach was no doubt challenging to manage, but the successful outcome means it should be looked to as an exemplar by all local and regional governments, and clients.
