light rail, Major Projects & Infrastructure, Sustainability, Track & Civil Construction

Green Track initiative wins architecture accolades

The Parramatta Light Rail’s Green Track initiative has won two categories of the Australian Institute of Landscape Architects (AILA) New South Wales 2022 Awards.

Transport for NSW was awarded Landscape Architecture Awards in both the Infrastructure and the Research, Policy and Communications categories for its research study Green track for Parramatta Light Rail.

Conducted in partnership with Western Sydney University, the study was commissioned to assess the viability of green track for the Parramatta Light Rail project.

The study was instrumental in more than 1.3 kilometres of green track being installed across three sections in the project’s first stage: the Cumberland Precinct, the Robin Thomas Reserve, and Tramway Avenue in Parramatta.

The sections represent the first green track laid in New South Wales and the longest stretch in Australia.

The awards jury commended the research study commended the research for its innovation and practicality.

“The intellectual rigor and commitment to collaboration across disciplines such as engineering, climate science, soil, biodiversity and landscape architecture demonstrates a truly integrated and creative approach to design,” the jury wrote in a statement.

“The problem-solving is elegant and unyielding, the outcome transformational and no-doubt one that will enable more sensitive and systems-based approaches to creating resilient, cool, and inspiring places in future.”

State award winners will proceed to the National Landscape Architecture Awards program later this year.

Stage 1 of the Parramatta Light Rail is expected to commence passenger services in 2023.

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