Melbourne Skyfarm – another example of repurposing car parks

This proposed development, Melbourne Skyfarm, will transform the 2,000 sqm rooftop area of the Siddeley St car park into an urban farm, adding greenery to Melbourne’s landscape. Moreover, Skyfarm aims to create awareness about urban farming, which can absorb heat, improving the temperature in city centres. These green islands can also benefit animal life by […]

Car park design inspiration

We are known enthusiasts of well-designed car parks and are thrilled whenever we find car park buildings that don’t get defined by the utilitarian aspect of the service and create a positive visual impact (see some of our previous posts: Another astonishing car park design and Parking design, a Dutch case). The Herma parking building […]

Unique underground structure to fit Opera House’s design

That the Sydney Opera House has a unique design we all know, but are you familiar with its ‘doughnut-shaped’ double helix car park? According to ABC, the car park design is one-of-a-kind that can’t be found anywhere else in the world.   Philip Pells and Neil Fimeri, two of the key people involved in the […]

Exploring internal and external wayfinding communication

Although the civil design and architecture foundations of a site dictate how people move around at a structural level, the wayfinding system is the communication layer guiding the navigation into and through the built environment. The wayfinding system provides numerous clues for users so that they can easily find what they are looking for. At […]

Royal Randwick Racecourse Car Park

  Our team is pleased to see the progress on construction of the Australian Turf Club’s new 580 bay multi-storey car park at Royal Randwick Racecourse. ptc. provided parking and traffic advice including the development of the car park design and the specification and tender for the access control and parking guidance systems to be […]

Trends that will shape the future of parking

Driverless cars, walkable cities, smart cities and sustainability concerns are some of the trends that are affecting or will affect the way people travel and how public policies are defined. Those different movements converge towards one direction: a reduction in parking supply (or at least a reduction in the growth of supply) and possibly demand,…...

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Car-free developments

Architects are developing creative and new designs to support different lifestyles as a response to consumers who value sustainability and are willing to give up car ownership. In the Wayfinding Forum Blog, we have posted about innovative designs, such as Oslo Solar and Cykelhuset, which illustrate those kinds of initiatives. Oslo Solar is a new…...

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No place for cars in Oslo development

A new high-rise in Oslo’s centre will give preference to cyclists instead of drivers, according to CO.EXIST. Oslo Solar building will have 500 parking spaces for bikes, as well as end-of-trip facilities such as showers, change rooms and bike repair stations.  There will be 10 recharge stations for electric vehicles, however, the high-rise won’t provide […]

NYC’s World Trade Center Transportation Hub receives mixed reviews

Nearly 15 years after the terrorist attacks of 9/11, and US$4 billion later, the World Trade Center (WTC) Transportation Hub has now partially opened to the public, according to businessinsider.com.au.  The Hub serves as a connection between New Jersey’s PATH trains and NYC subways. The design for the hub was first revealed in 2004.  It was […]

Design & fashion make their way to the car park

Ask anyone about the definition of a car park, and you will instantly hear words such as: congestion, nightmare, traffic, expensive, hard to use or perhaps “I can never find my car”.  But has anyone ever responded with “they are the best place to hold a fashion show”?  Perhaps not. Earlier this year the British […]

London: Cycling now considered mass transport

Transport for London’s new Cycling Design Standards Policy begins with the words “Cycling is now mass transport and must be treated as such”.  Councils in London boroughs are now requiring developers to integrate this approach into their development plans. A recent example is the 250 City Road project which was required to include ample parking […]

New York: Parking Grand Central style

So you’re spending a lazy Sunday in New York browsing through the options for an apartment upgrade and you come across 443 Greenwich in Tribeca, New York offering (among the “amenities”) a car park inspired by Grand Central Station complete with valet parking, convenient bike racks and a dedicated entry ramp for cyclists. The following […]

2014 Australia and New Zealand Green Building Market Report

Photo Credit:  Sourceable.net The 2014 Green Building market report for Australia and New Zealand has just been released.  Between March and May 2014, 133 developers, architects, builders and subcontractors in Australia and 110 in New Zealand provided feedback on their views and experiences with green building. Findings include: In Australia:  90% of respondents have been […]

Rise of the elevator car park

The evolution and adoption of the automobile as an everyday necessity is one of the most impacting of the 20th Century.  In 1886 the ‘modern car’ was developed by Karl Benz and only 22 years later in 1908 the first Model T became available to the mass population. Move ahead only 20 years and the […]

Focus on car park design

A recent architectural competition in the US by Combo Competitions has brought attention back to “parking garages”. Combo’s premise is to introduce an additional element to the competitions it organises (another structure, a new function tied to the main one or something completely different, as long as it adds value to the project). Combo recognised […]

A Parisian car park challenge

The Peninsula Hotel, situated in the heart of Paris was built in 1908, one of its many claims to fame being the site where George Gershwin wrote “An American in Paris” in 1928. It took two years to build and has recently undergone a four year restoration to bring it back to its former glory. […]

Record price for parking in NYC

Trendy SoHo in New York City is in the news for setting a record asking price for a parking spot.  The new project at 42 Crosby Street was a former parking lot and is now being developed into 10 luxury apartments (architect Annabelle Selldorf’s rendering above), as reported in the NY Times.  With apartments priced […]

Innovative car park with roof-top sports ground

The latest addition to our list of “Alternative uses for a Car Park” will now include “sporting field”.  The University of Colorado in Colorado Springs has recently completed a new car park which doubles as a sports venue, as reported in The Gazette.  With its ribbon-cutting ceremony this month, the USD $23M project will simultaneously […]

Car park conversion to luxury apartments

Melbourne developer, Grocon, is breaking down the miserable reputation of the car park with a rather unusual project.  The development, known as QV8, is converting part of a car park into luxury apartments, as reported by news.com.au.  Located on the top floor of the car park in the QV building on Lonsdale Street, the finished […]

Beautiful engineering creates cycling heaven in The Netherlands

There’s no shortage of cycle-friendly stories coming out of Europe, and we love sharing them with you.  This recent post from Treehugger should provide both inspiration and aspiration for other cities and urban planners that are working on cycling solutions. The Hovenring is the first elevated cycle roundabout in the world.  Commissioned by the Dutch […]

Architecture accolades for Perth Arena

Perth Arena has added another accolade to its growing list of prestigious awards.  As reported in ArchitectureAU, the designers ARM Architecture and Cameron Chisholm Nicol were recently recognised with the top national architecture award, the Sir Zelman Cowen Award for Public Architecture. The award jury described the structure as a ‘radical, abstract, graphic alien that […]

Contemporary car park turning heads

Thank goodness for the creative types who are turning the traditional vision of a car park on its ear! Reported this week in Designboom, Vienna based architects, PPAG, (in collaboration with Milan Mijalkovic) have recently completed this 3D patterned multi-storey car park in Skopje, Macedonia. The project began when architect, Anna Popelka, created a collage […]

Car park transformed into trendy bookshop

The Librarie Avant-Garde in Nanjing has recently been voted China’s most beautiful book shop, which is rather surprising given its humble origins.  It is located in a disused government car park beneath a stadium, formerly a bomb shelter.  “There is an old saying in Chinese — turn something rotten into a miracle“, says the owner, […]

Car parks – the perfect solar opportunity

It’s a match made in heaven — car parks and the sun above.  Why wouldn’t one take advantage of a free supply of energy will that could conceivably make a multi-story structure carbon-neutral?  The beachside haven of Coffs Harbour has taken another step towards its goal of becoming a “solar city”.   Councilmembers voted unanimously to […]

Remember the Jetsons?

We complain about traffic snarls. We complain about transport links. We complain about airport processing queues. Well, it seems the creators of the imagined “Horizon System” had all this in mind when they submitted their winning entry to the Glasgow School of Art creative competition, offering a vision of the future of aviation. Watch their […]

Japan’s underground bike parking solution

Tokyo is a metropolis of over 13 million people, all trying to get around by the best means possible. Overwhelming congestion means that car travel is sluggish and we’ve all seen images of “train pushers” (or oshiya) cramming passengers onto Japan’s subway system. As a result, cycling is trending as a preference for many commuters. […]

George Street makeover a step closer

Both the State Government and the City of Sydney agree that light rail from Circular Quay to the city’s east along George Street will be a great thing for Sydney. The vision is for an integrated transport network able to move large groups of commuters quickly and effectively around the CBD and out to major […]

Compact automated parking garage launched in LA

AutoParkiT has just been launched in the Van Nuys district of Los Angeles. The system is designed to automatically park, store and retrieve vehicles in a compact parking structure, using Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology containing details of the user to ensure the swift identification and retrieval of vehicles. Whilst automated mechanical parking is not new, this […]

Hobart’s Bike Hubs turn drab into art

Bicycle racks are generally seen as a functional yet drab and unimaginative element of the urban landscape. In Hobart, recently commissioned bike hubs, have turned that idea on its head. The bike hubs are the vision of local architect and designer, Ken Betlehem, to whom they represent an understanding of international bike parking best practice, […]

Car park design – an interesting beast

  In any development, there is a fine line between the interests of the engineer, the developer, the investor and the end user. Ultimately all are after a solution which works, but it can be the age-old battle between cost and benefit which dictates terms. In a previous post entitled Why Simple Design is Often […]


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