Winter Street: Creating Community Connection through Placemaking and Data

The Context

Malvern’s Winter Street “pocket park” presented a classic urban design failure: a residual green space strategically located between a toy library, a childcare centre, and a supermarket, yet completely underutilised. The site offered zero amenity, two lonely benches meant local workers ate lunch on the ground and families transited through without pausing. The City of Stonnington required a rapid, evidence-based intervention to test the site’s potential before committing to significant capital works.

The Collaboration

POMO was engaged directly by the City of Stonnington to lead a “test and trial” tactical urbanism project. We facilitated a targeted co-design process involving the Stonnington Toy Library, Glenferrie Road Malvern Business Association, and internal council teams (Parks, Economic Development, and Engineering). This rigorous stakeholder alignment ensured the temporary activation would meet the specific operational needs of adjacent traders and community groups from day one.

Delivering Winter Street: The Implementation Process

Our mandate was to move beyond “beautification” to deliver a high-performing, measurable public asset on a micro-budget. We treated the pop-up as a live technical pilot.

Custom Sensor Technology: To validate the investment, POMO’s R&D arm, POMO LAB, engineered and deployed a prototype Wi-Fi-based people counter. Unlike standard manual counts, this device provided 24/7 distinct user data, allowing us to map dwell times against specific times of day (e.g., confirming the 11 am–12 pm peak for families).
Circular Economy Fabrication: We bypassed supply chain delays and material costs by conducting a “waste audit” at the Council’s transfer station. We identified and salvaged high-value items destined for landfill, repurposing them into bespoke seating elements.
Sustainable Material Specification: Complementing the salvaged items, we procured plantation pine and bush logs directly from the mill to minimise embodied carbon. The design featured planter-based trees to immediately mitigate the urban heat island effect without requiring excavation or complex civil works.
Technical Lighting Integration: To extend the economy of the park into the evening, we designed and installed a creative lighting solution. This required careful technical detailing to ensure compliance with public safety standards (AS 1158) while creating an inviting atmosphere that successfully disrupted anti-social behaviour after dark.

The Impact: Economic & Social Value

The project shifted the conversation from “aesthetic value” to “hard data,” proving that low-cost interventions can drive massive ROI.

Visitation skyrocketed: From an estimated 120 visits per month to over 2,500, representing a 1983% increase in measured activity.
Economic impact: Visitor surveys confirmed the park became an economic driver, with an average spend of $20.84 per visitor in the surrounding precinct.
Sustained community use: Originally scoped as a 12-month trial, the infrastructure remains in place two years later due to overwhelming community demand, with 94% of visitors stating they would return.
Data-backed planning: The insights gathered from our custom sensors are now shaping the long-term capital investment strategy for the site, de-risking the Council’s future expenditure.

Sustainability Outcomes

Social Sustainability Outcomes

Fosters a More Cohesive and Inclusive Community: The project was specifically designed to cater to a diverse range of users, including local workers, teenagers, and young children. By providing a safe and welcoming space with seating, shade, and activities for different groups, it encourages interaction between various community demographics who might not otherwise connect, strengthening social bonds.
Enhances Public Safety and Extends Community Life: The inclusion of a nighttime lighting experience is a key feature that addresses safety concerns. This makes the park usable after dark, effectively extending the public life of the area and providing a safe thoroughfare and evening destination for residents.
Promotes Active and Healthy Lifestyles: The strategy of “programming” the space with activities like yoga, children’s events, and fitness sessions directly encourages residents to be more active. It transforms a passive park into a hub for community well-being, contributing to positive public health outcomes.
Builds Community Capacity and Ownership: The engagement process, which involved workshops with local businesses and community representatives, ensures the design reflects local needs and aspirations. This co-design approach fosters a strong sense of community ownership and pride in the final space, making it more likely to be cared for and activated by locals in the long term.

Environmental Sustainability Outcomes

Promotes a Circular Economy through Material Reuse: A clear environmental benefit is the use of salvaged and repurposed plantation pine timber. This approach reduces the demand for virgin materials, which in turn saves energy, reduces carbon emissions from processing and transportation, and diverts usable materials from ending up in landfill.
Improves Urban Microclimate and Biodiversity: The addition of greenery and the plan to introduce more trees in the future will have a positive environmental impact. Trees help cool the urban environment, reduce the “heat island” effect, improve air quality, and can provide a small but valuable habitat for local birds and insects, contributing to urban biodiversity.
Data-Informed Sustainable Development: The project serves as a pilot or “test case,” gathering data on how the community uses the space. This information will inform future, larger-scale investments, ensuring that subsequent developments are more resource-efficient and better aligned with genuine community needs, preventing wasteful expenditure on underused facilities.

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