A strategy to ensure a vibrant city center
Parkes is the largest town and administrative centre of the Parkes Shire. While its centre holds many attractions, the main street is currently challenged by empty shopfronts and a car-centric street layout. In close collaboration with Parkes Shire Council and the local community, arki_lab created a new 10-year strategy for the future development of the Parkes Central Business District (CBD). The Parkes CBD Vibrancy Strategy 2026 serves as a tactical guide, featuring a range of concrete initiatives designed for easy implementation and long term goals for a vibrant town centre. These actions cover everything from recreational facilities and traffic to business and urban space, ensuring a vibrant town centre where both residents and visitors can thrive.

Co-creating the strategy 
The resulting strategy is built upon an ambitious and multi-layered engagement process. Through an extensive community engagement process involving public workshops, stakeholder interviews, and a digital survey, we gathered more than 650 unique inputs, providing the community’s perspective on existing challenges and qualities in the Parkes CBD, as well as aspiration for the area's further development. To ensure accuracy, we shared preliminary findings with the community for evaluation, allowing residents to provide feedback and catch any missed perspectives, reaching the highest level of community engagement in the council’s recent history.

To support the understanding of the CBD feel, look and structure, multiple site visits and architectural analyses took place in the Parkes CBD and surrounding area. Additionally, extensive review of existing studies and reports ensured a solid foundation of knowledge for the plan.

A focus on practical implementation  
Based on the whole consultation process, we developed a vision structured under four key themes: Mobility, Appearance, Activities, and Places. For each theme, we propose three concrete, mutually complementary strategies for improvement. To ensure the strategies are feasible, we have developed a series of practical initiatives that address both short- and long-term perspectives, turning the final strategy into a functional guide for implementation. The strategy is designed to ensure that the Parkes CBD evolves into a resilient, accessible, and inclusive heart for the entire region.