Ballarat Community Infrastructure Design Guidelines
Designing inclusive, safe and welcoming community facilities
The Challenge
Currently, the City of Ballarat does not have standard guidance on how new community facilities are planned, designed or delivered. This has resulted in new community facilities that are not fit for purpose, and do not accommodate diverse community needs. By 2036, more than 142,000 residents will call The City of Ballarat home and this growth and change, combined with evolving ways of living, working and recreating, presents an opportunity to improve approaches to planning and designing community facilities.
CoFutures, in partnership with Mantric Architecture, is preparing Community Infrastructure Design Guidelines to guide the planning, design and delivery of community facilities across the City of Ballarat.
What We Did
- Assessed and benchmarked the range of community facilities across the City of Ballarat.
- Reviewed demographic trends and change to determine the types of facilities that may be under the most pressure.
- Undertook a broad range of community engagement to gather feedback about community facilities. This included an online project page, survey, multi-media storytelling tool, and visual communication collateral explaining the importance of community facilities.
- Prepared an engagement findings report to provide Council with insights around how to create safe, welcoming and inclusive community facilities.
- Engaged with young people with disabilities to gain perspectives about lived experiences, barriers and access to community facilities.
- Developed Community Infrastructure Design Guidelines for libraries, community halls, maternal child healthcare and kindergartens.
Outcomes
To date, community consultation and youth engagement has been undertaken to inform an initial draft of the design guidelines. When completed (in early 2024), the Guidelines will provide clear schedules, operational requirements and design guidance around the delivery of new libraries, community halls, MCH and kindergartens.
