Case Studies
City of Stonnington Strategy for Creating Open Space
Design Feature
Type of project
Policy
State
Victoria
Location
Urban
The City of Stonnington Strategy for Creating Open Space, implemented in 2013, aims to address a chronic shortage of Public Open Space within the municipality. The 20-year strategy is designed to increase the amount of open space within Stonnington by:
While this strategy is still ongoing, Council has already successfully created an additional 6,800 square metres of open space, with another significant project underway to increase this area by a further 9,000 square metres.
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Creating a financially sustainable model for land purchases
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Identifying land for purchase
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Identifying cark parks for conversion to open space
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Creating links between existing spaces
While this strategy is still ongoing, Council has already successfully created an additional 6,800 square metres of open space, with another significant project underway to increase this area by a further 9,000 square metres.
Creating space through policy
The City of Stonnington has the second lowest amount of open space per capita (20 square metres per person) of any local government area in Victoria. Council developed this strategy to proactively preserve and increase public open space within Stonnington. By providing more open space, opportunities have been created for residents and visitors to be more physically active and to socialise in safe and appealing spaces.
In developing the Strategy for Creating Open Space, Council engaged with residents to understand the value of open space to the community. Households (599) were randomly selected to complete a face-to-face survey. Approximately 91% of the community believed that creating new open space for current and future generations was highly important and a further 79% of respondents supported the use of all aspects of the Strategies for Creating Open Space.
In developing the Strategy for Creating Open Space, Council engaged with residents to understand the value of open space to the community. Households (599) were randomly selected to complete a face-to-face survey. Approximately 91% of the community believed that creating new open space for current and future generations was highly important and a further 79% of respondents supported the use of all aspects of the Strategies for Creating Open Space.
Council publishes all land purchased in line with this strategy in a quarterly publication and undertakes further community consultation before development public realm upgrades can commence. To date, the main achievements of the Strategy include:
- Council has purchased 14 properties for conversion to open space and several properties have been reserved via public acquisition overlay, including investing $3 million - $7 million annually
- In 2015, Planning Scheme Amendment C186 was approved which requires a 5-8% contribution for all subdivisions within Stonnington.
- This amendment is predicted to produce an additional $102 million by end of 17/18 Financial Year in contributions to the Council’s open space reserve fund of $44 million.
- Cato Square - A project is underway to convert a car park with an area of approximately 9000 square meters to provide new open space. Council will invest $60 million in 2017/2018 towards the development of the Cato Square project
- “Pop-up Parks” have been created across the municipality
- The adoption of Structure Plans to create ‘green links’ within activity centres, which will strengthen active movement networks.
Project team
- City of Stonnington - Advocacy, Performance and Improvement
- City of Stonnington - City Strategy
- City of Stonnington - Parks and Environment
- City of Stonnington - Urban and Infrastructure Projects
- City of Stonnington - Finance
Project Cost
- Initial cost of $50,000 - planning scheme amendment
Health value
The strategy aims to create high quality public open spaces to enable and encourage residents to be more active in the comfort of their local area.
Economic value
- As part of this strategy, long term financial modelling has been undertaken providing a sustainable model for the creation of open space.
- Additionally, funds generated as part of the Planning Scheme Amendment are placed in a reserve fund for the sole purpose of purchasing of open space, meaning that a sustainable financial model has been created for the improvement and purchase of open space for the next 20 years and beyond.
Environmental Value
- The addition of over 6,800 square meters of public open space has the additional benefits of supporting urban cooling and working to reduce the heat impacts of a highly urbanised environment.
Social value
- The increase in public open space allows current and future residents to utilise the parks to be socially connected within their community.
- The strategy has added thousands of square meters of high quality land for formal and informal sport, fun and gathering.
Use value
- Since the strategy was adopted, an additional 6,800 square metres of open space has been created within the Council boundaries.
- Improvement works have been completed on several existing spaces and green links have been created to better connect existing space.
- Ultimately, this has improved the experience of Stonnington residents, who now have far greater access to green space.
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