Helena
Woodbridge Lakes
Woodbridge Lakes, at the western end of the Railway Workshops site around the former coal dam, is an environmentally friendly, medium-density residential neighbourhood. Home designs will be compatible with the area’s heritage character and incorporate ecologically sustainable design and crime prevention principles. A boardwalk around the dam, nearby parklands along the Helena River bed and public open spaces featuring distinctive artworks add to the area’s amenity.
Workshops Village
The Workshops Village provides a unique mix of cultural and built heritage character. The Railway Workshops buildings will be adapted for residential and commercial uses, with Block 1 housing the proposed rail heritage centre. The Power House, Copper Shop and Pattern Shop will have heritage activities of interest to visitors and may include creative industries and educational opportunities. A walk trail links buildings, equipment and sites, interpreting the former use of the area and recognising the heritage value of the Workshops.
An integrated community education facility for all levels of learning is planned as the central hub of the Workshops Village. This location is highly accessible, close to the Midland train station and bus interchange.
The education precinct adapts several heritage buildings, linking them to new facilities for tertiary level education and associated uses. These facilities will frame the open piazza of Railway Square and give this historic area a modern campus character.
The Foundry will be adapted as the contemporary home of a creative industries enclave housing glass blowers, sculptors, fine wood craftsmen and an assortment of creative initiatives. It is intended that the addition of an iconic ‘extrusion’ at the western end of the Foundry will provide the Workshops Village with a theatre, café and gallery retail space for the products of the creative industries domiciled in the Foundry and surrounding buildings.
Landscaping and design will reinforce the heritage spaces and buildings and highlight the vistas from Woodbridge Lakes in the west to the Darling Range escarpment in the east.
The Heritage Green, located south of the Foundry and including other heritage buildings such at the Power House, will bring together the activities of the Workshops Village and provide a common link between the heritage, education and residential uses to create a sense of place and community within the village area.
Bushland along the Helena River and the adaptive reuse of several of the large heritage buildings provides a unique setting for the Workshops Village main residential area.
Pedestrian and bike paths provide easy access to all nearby areas.
A public art strategy for the Workshops Village will build on the impressive Workers’ Wall near Block 1 an the verge sculptures along Yelverton Drive that celebrate the precinct’s history.
