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Designs released for Mall overhaul

August 4, 2022 BY

Towards the future: Bridge Mall Traders Association vice-president Shane Donnithorne, City of Ballarat mayor Cr Daniel Moloney, Hassell principal Mark Haycox and deputy-mayor Cr Amy Johnson. Photo: TIM BOTTAMS

THE final designs have been revealed for Bridge Mall’s fifteen-million-dollar redevelopment.

Works include the final plan for reintroduction of traffic to Bridge Street, a modified children’s play space, and landscaping.

With funds allocated for the project in 2019, City of Ballarat mayor Cr Daniel Moloney said the works aims to deliver a new take on what came before.

“We’re really now looking to tinker with the treatments to make sure they reflect the character of Ballarat, that it’s a warm, inviting area from Sturt Street into a new Bridge Street,” he said.

“One of the things I love the most is reusing some of the bluestone out of the sail yards. To have them down as key features as a car drives over them not only alerts the cars to pedestrians, but the pedestrian will hear the noise as well… and yet they still look beautiful and it harkens back to Ballarat’s past.

“It does the visual, the auditory, and that whole sense of being in Ballarat all through the choice of materials so these things are important.”

The one-way traffic will be directed from Sturt Street with additional lighting and barriers as well as a window showcasing the Yarrowee River underfoot.

The reconfigured entry from Sturt to Bridge streets will include the closing of southern flow traffic along Grenville Street. Image: SUPPLIED

Early construction is expected to begin at Christmas followed by major works in early 2023 planned to last 12 to 18 months.

It is expected more than $17 million will be required to achieve the project’s full scope.

Global architectural firm Hassell were chosen to design the project, and principal Mark Haycox said the final plans have been a collaborative process.

“It’s not a transaction where the client hands a brief and we go and do it. It’s actually a hand-in-glove and very intricate process,” he said.

“Collectively, that consultation, that engagement with the state, with the traders, the community, all of the inputs… has really provided an in-depth amount of knowledge and experience.”