REVEALED: Queensland’s best new playgrounds and open spaces 2023
Queensland’s best new playgrounds and open spaces have been revealed, with the state taking home top honours for incredible designs. SEE THE LIST
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We’re spoilt for choice when it comes to breathtaking travel destinations in Queensland.
Our beaches, rivers and greenery are simply world class.
Over time Queensland has become known for more than just its natural beauty, with our playgrounds and open spaces now representative of our evolving culture.
This week Queensland has been recognised as an architecture giant, with playgrounds and open spaces receiving awards in the Australian Institute of Landscape Architects annual honours list as well as the Parks and Leisure Australia Regional Awards (QLD).
See some of the best new playgrounds and open spaces.
Heritage Lanes, Brisbane city
Australian Institute of Landscape Architects Qld State Awards: Award of Excellence for civic landscape
Heritage Lanes, 80 Ann St, successfully unlocks valuable civic space for community use, providing a key cross block connection for the western extents of Brisbane’s city centre, between Ann and Turbot Streets.
A considered balance of historical reference and artistic celebration has been intertwined into a verdant landscape on both ground plane and tower, which provides relief from the city streets and celebrates the southeast Queensland bioregion.
Together, the public laneways and tower planting demonstrate how constrained city sites can maximise public use and urban greening, to achieve a climatically responsive outcome, respectful of history and environment.
Hinterland Adventure Playground, Cooroy
Australian Institute of Landscape Architects Qld State Awards: Award of Excellence for playspaces
The Hinterland Adventure Playground on Marara Street in Cooroy, is a destination play experience for the Noosa Council and the greater Sunshine Coast region.
It comprises an immersive all abilities nature play experience, traversing the site’s natural and industrial heritage.
Children and adults alike are inspired by a variety of play zones ranging from quiet reflective spaces to highly active adventure play zones.
The play spaces are linked via a series of formal and informal paths, playful steppers and small tracks through the landscape. There are also BBQs areas with tables and small turf areas for picnics and play.
Southport Broadwater Parklands Play Attraction, Gold Coast
Australian Institute of Landscape Architects Qld State Awards: Landscape Architecture Award for play spaces
Parks and Leisure Australia Regional Awards (QLD): Playspace Award over $. 5M
The Broadwater Play Attraction Project is the most recent addition to the Southport Broadwater Parklands (SBP), on Marine Parade on the Gold Coast, delivering a new, major destination playground for the northern precinct.
Its vision is centred around the unique setting, providing a multifaceted, deeply layered design outcome that draws on the Broadwater environment – a place that marks the exchange between river and ocean, expressing a connection between land, sea and sky.
The central landmark play tower stands boldly, anchoring the play space around a series of large, sculpted mounds, containing a highly engaging play environment for users of all ages and abilities to explore.
Hanlon Park / Bur’uda Waterway Rejuvenation, Stones Corner
Australian Institute of Landscape Architects Qld State Awards: Landscape Architecture Award for land management and Parks and Open Space
The Hanlon Park/Bur’uda Waterway Rejuvenation on Lincoln St, Stones Corner, has returned nature to inner-city Brisbane, following an ambitious council program to holistically rethink the Norman Creek catchment.
Previously an under-utilised space with a concrete-lined channel, the newly naturalised creek has become a thriving place for people, thanks to a design that responds to country, community, and ecology. The project reassessed historic flood mitigation practices through an ecological and community lens, bringing with it the joy and wildness of a creek.
Beazley Park, Rolleston, Central Queensland
Parks and Leisure Australia Regional Awards (QLD): Commendation for Playspace Award under $.5M
Rolleston lies in the centre of a rich, resourceful and beautiful valley, about 70km east of Springsure in the Central Queensland Highlands.
The sandstone cliffs that follow the Carnarvon, Expedition and Shotover Ranges mark the boundaries of this fertile agricultural district.
Beazley Park, in the heart of Rolleston, features Purbrook Hut, an art gallery, coffee cart, outdoor cinema, playground and picnic amenities.
Pimpama Sports Hub, Gold Coast
Parks and Leisure Australia Regional Awards (QLD): Community Facility of the Year Award
Pimpama Sports Hub on Rifle Range Rd, Pimpama, is the largest sports precinct on the northern Gold Coast. Its amenities include an aquatics centre and a community centre, along with fitness, tennis and netball centres. The sports hub is surrounded by parklands with a playground and barbecue area and also an event space available for booking.
Minjerribah Lookouts
Australian Institute of Landscape Architects Qld State Awards: Landscape Architecture Award
CUSP, a landscape architecture and urban design studio based in Brisbane, was engaged by the Quandamooka Yoolooburrabee Aboriginal Corporation (QYAC) and the Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service to develop the concept and detailed design of two small viewing platforms and trail connections that alight the highest peaks of Quandamooka Country, in Naree Budjong Djara National Park, on Minjerribah (North Stradbroke Island).
The platforms are key destinations of the QYAC Trail Plan, which aims to provide safe, unique walking experiences while preserving cultural sites and sensitive environmental areas.
CUSP ensured cultural practices were respected, and there was minimal construction impact.
This was achieved though respectful collaboration of listening, knowledge-sharing and by devising a highly innovative, low-impact solution for an endangered heathland environment.
Mooloolaba Foreshore Revitalisation – Northern Parkland
Australian Institute of Landscape Architects Qld State Awards: Landscape Architecture Award for Parks and Open Space
The $16m revitalised Mooloolaba Foreshore Northern Parkland, near the Brisbane Rd entry point to Mooloolaba Esplanade has been delivered by Sunshine Coast Council with assistance from the Queensland Government.
A former caravan park, the one-hectare site features a 200 metre accessible boardwalk, open grassed spaces, ocean viewing decks, barbecues, an adventure playground, paths, seating and an upgraded seawall.
More than 10,000 new plants and 150 new trees have been planted.
The transformational design draws inspiration from the natural beauty of the surrounding coastal landscape and the community’s values. It provides enhanced community accessibility and amenity, along with significant environmental and economic benefits ahead of the 2032 Brisbane Olympic and Paralympic Games.
Beenleigh Town Centre Streetscape, Logan
Australian Institute of Landscape Architects Qld State Awards: Landscape Architecture Award for Urban Design
The Beenleigh Streetscape Improvement and Shade Solution project on Kent and surrounding streets, has changed the face of Beenleigh by providing improved economic, social, and environmental outcomes for long-term community benefit.
The project has been the catalyst for the regeneration of Beenleigh’s Town Centre, focused around the town square, and demonstrates the opportunity to create a comfortable and attractive public realm which consolidates a distinctive local character and stimulates investment and activation.
Harald Falge Park, Cairns
Parks and Leisure Australia Regional Awards (QLD): Commendation for Park of the Year Award
Designed with the community in mind, Harald Falge Park on English St, Manunda, has been transformed with that installation of new playgrounds, a multipurpose sporting court, new pathways, lighting, a toilet block and closed circuit television (CCTV) cameras.
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Originally published as REVEALED: Queensland’s best new playgrounds and open spaces 2023
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