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New South Wales Sites
Glebe Foreshore Walk
introduction / overview / images / location / Projects
Landscape Architect: James Mather Delaney Design Pty Ltd
Location: Glebe Foreshore Walk, from Rozelle Bay to Blackwattle Bay
(easiest entrance via Bicentennial Park at the bottom of Glebe Point Road, Glebe)
OVERVIEW
The Glebe Foreshore Walk is significant in that it is a harbour edge walk in a highly urbanised part of Sydney, in which we have introduced substantial marine habitat whilst responding to a rich industrial heritage context.
It will form the western most segment (over two kilometres long) of the City of Sydney’s planned foreshore walk, stretching from Woolloomooloo to Rozelle Bay. It has created varied and intimate spaces, the means to access the water, ecological habitats, interpretation of heritage and archaeology and used WSUD principals.
This staged and ongoing project has reached a major milestone with its opening to the public. Many of the habitat areas and plantings are to an extent experimental and currently juvenile. These will require years to establish, however the structure of the project is in place and its design intentions clearly articulated and legible.
Budget: $15mil to date
Developer: The City of Sydney Completed: November 2006
Description
Innovative design or demonstration of new direction in profession
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Insertion of a foreshore walk into the dense historical fabric of the Glebe Foreshore to provide pedestrian and cycle amenity and ecological outcomes, whilst solving problems of contamination, sea wall collapse, sea wall overtopping, poorly performing 1980’s vegetation, and requirements for continuous service vehicle access.
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Insertion of foreshore walk around archaeological traces.
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The transplantation of Mangrove seedlings from Homebush Bay.
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Area behind sea wall was excavated to precise levels required for mangrove habitat.
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Soil mix rich in silts was specifically designed for the mangrove area.
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Beach was created for small boat launching with specific matching between sand grain size and beach slope.
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Increased access to water and low tide beaches provided.
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Lead consultant managing complex team including, arborist, geotech, structural and civil engineers, architects, ecologist, remediation consultant, marine engineer, lighting designer and electrical engineer, access consultant, archaeologist, heritage architect, planner.
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Preparation of complex approval documents dealing with Local Government, Fisheries, NSW Maritime, Heritage Council, Department of Planning, Sydney Water.
Concept
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Design the walkway as an unfolding event in which the spatial experience, the rhythm and tempo is subtly manipulated to reflect the site’s micro context.
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Utilise basic elements of landscape architectural language to articulate the concept, ie paths, stairs, and level changes.
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Develop a simple palette of materials and forms to combine in differing arrangements in response to the required tempo.
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Celebrate the many layers found on the site by inserting a clearly legible new layer.
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Where sea walls are too low insert new walls behind to maintain their integrity and create a new edge for sitting.
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Celebrate the industrial history and character of the site.
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Conserve and bring to attention the many different types of concrete around the foreshore by exposing their aggregates and contrasting them with new materials.
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Add to this richness by introducing a new blend of concrete.
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Create areas of rest along the walk which respond to changed site conditions, eg a change in the sea wall construction, the presence of a low tide beach, the junction with another access route, a historical feature.
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Maximise incidental seating.
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Articulate the walkway to minimize the impact of service vehicle access.
Appropriateness to function.
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The Glebe Foreshore walk caters to the functional requirements of its many users, allowing for a rich and varied experience which provides a subtle interpretation of the sites history without being didactic.
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Pavement materials used were sandstone, concrete and asphalt. Walling materials used were basalt riprap, sandstone cladding, mass sandstone, precast concrete and in situ concrete. Concrete was used throughout the project for its mass, its ability to complement both the naturally occurring sandstone and the sea walls.
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The precast concrete contains a quartz rich sand mix that gives the units a warm colour and a slight sparkle that sits particularly well with the existing sandstone. The concrete offers a durable and cost effective compliment to the high quality sandstone necessary in the intertidal zone.
Response to brief
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The project has clearly responded to the project brief in delivering a high quality foreshore walk that maximised the ecological opportunities present on the site whilst addressing the community desires.
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The Project extended the brief where opportunities presented themselves to extend amenity, richness and ecological outcomes.
Sensitivity to social, cultural, historical, physical and natural context.
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Community consultation undertaken and responses incorporated.
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The design, at all times works with the existing fabric and its context, responding to and maximising the legibility of its natural features, its cultural context and its historical fragments. Sandstone outcrops, beaches, existing vegetation, industrial remnants such as concrete copings and walls, access routes, old water stairs, the historic villa “Bellevue”, the work of Bruce Mackenzie at Bicentennial Park, are all brought into relief, tension or harmony in the design of Glebe Foreshore Walk.
Quality of implementation of built work.
- The concept made several strategic decisions about the use of modular precast systems and a limited pallete to assure a high quality of construction was achievable.
Environmental responsibility and sustainability
- Incorporates bio swales and WSUD principles.
- Retains and protects existing foreshore habitat.
- Remediation works carried out in parklands.
- Minimal intervention to stabilize existing heritage wall resulted in economical use of materials.
- Use of recycled glass as a filter material in the bioswales.
Promotes biodiversity and supports local ecosystems.
- Construction of mangrove habitat in Rozelle Bay parkland where harbour had been reclaimed with contaminated fill.
- The overtopping of the Rozelle Canal was managed as an opportunity to extend the salt marsh habitat. New wall elements regulate grades to achieve extended areas at critical slope and inundation levels to foster salt marsh.
- Bio swales introduced to divert and polish storm water from adjacent roadways before entering harbour.
- New endemic plantings introduced from local seed stocks and community nursery.
- Inter tidal habitat zones increased by the introduction of the beach and mangrove.
- Introduced water edge planting as important contributor to marine habitat.
- Basalt sea wall was reconfigured to form a small rock island at high tide offering birds sanctuary.
- Existing basalt sea wall was partially lowered to allow gentle flows into newly formed mangrove area behind.
Relevance to the profession of landscape architecture, the public and the education of future practitioners.
- This large scale multidisciplinary public project which was led by landscape architects fused the complex demands of heritage, engineering, sensitive intertidal marine environments, and public open space requirements.
- This was achieved in a way that reflects upon and expands in a contemporary way on the ideas of genius loci explored by the Sydney Bush School.
- The informality sought by the Bush School was expressed in a playful, intimate and contemporary way.
- The smallest details of place were observed and responded to.
introduction / overview / images / location / Projects
2008
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