Future Village installs floating gardens to combat urban heat in Parramatta’s CBD
Garden creator, Future Village, has installed floating gardens in Centenary and Parramatta Squares as part of a heat reduction experiment to help keep the City of Parramatta cool over summer. The floating garden installations are expected to be on site until April and after the trial period, the plants will be reused for other projects.
Future Village has origins in Strathayr, an Australian leader in sports turf technology that has over the last 20 years developed portable sports surface products such as portable sports fields and drop-in cricket wickets that sister brand Portagrass manages. This background has installed a passion for precision and quality componentry and design in manufacturing products that can last in the Australian public environment.
This year’s Parramatta project follows the success of last summer’s trial in Parramatta Square and has been expanded to cover 58 square metres in the heart of Parramatta with 600 plants as well as 60 additional trays outside Accor Stadium.
The project explores the impacts and scalability of moveable garden trays in public spaces to help make these areas more comfortable on hot days.
City of Parramatta Lord Mayor Martin Zaiter said the project proved to be a big community win last year with people rating the project four and a half out of five stars.
Lord Mayor Martin Zaiter noted “Residents and visitors told us the floating garden improved the look and feel of our public spaces in the initial trial, so it was a no brainer for us to bring the program back to the City.
“While it’s still early days, the plants are proven to cool down our public spaces and create a mini urban oasis for our community.
“We’re proud to lead the way in sustainable initiatives like this one – we’ve been recognised globally for excellence in sustainable design for PHIVE and were the first to achieve Australian carbon neutral certification service in a public domain for Parramatta Square.”
Future Village received funding from the NSW Government for this project through the Office of the Chief Scientist & Engineer’s Small Business Innovation & Research (SBIR) Program and is collaborating with the University of Technology Sydney on the trial.
Future Village Director, Ben Perry said it made sense to expand the project further in Parramatta after a successful first trial round last year adding "our initial results confirm that a floating garden can effectively cool public spaces.
“Conducting a larger trial allowed us to validate these findings. We now aim to determine the green space required to maintain temperatures below 36°C during extreme heat.”
The NSW Government’s Chief Scientist & Engineer, Professor Hugh Durrant-Whyte said the SBIR Program is designed to support innovative small businesses to develop their technology to solve problems posed by NSW Government agencies, in this case the Urban Heat Island Challenge.
“Future Village’s floating garden solution is both an aesthetically pleasing and highly effective way to make our city centres more liveable in hot weather;” Professor Durrant-Whyte added.
“I congratulate the company and City of Parramatta for their forward thinking in achieving this outstanding result.”
The floating garden installations are expected to be on site until April and after the trial period, the plants will be reused for other projects.
Other Future Village successful projects include:
Floating Garden: Implemented in Wollongong, NSW, this project introduced a sustainable floating garden to enhance urban biodiversity.
Street Parklets: In Sutherland, NSW, we transformed street spaces into vibrant parklets, boosting local business engagement.
Floating Roof Top Garden: Our Bondi Junction, NSW project showcases a rooftop garden that improves building insulation and provides communal space.
Trial Road Closure: In Maroubra, NSW, we tested the impact of road closures by installing modular parklets, enhancing pedestrian areas.
Modular Urban Space Parklet: Our Blacktown, NSW initiative created flexible urban spaces for community gatherings.
Hanging Baskets: Implemented in Bondi Junction, NSW, these baskets added greenery to urban settings.
More information on Future Village
Image. Credit: City of Parramatta
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