Toowoomba Region Design is a call to action, aimed at promotion, advocacy and advancement of best practice design for our built environment.

We are committed to maintaining and enhancing our unique Region - ensuring design responds to context and place. Our 'Garden City' is the hub of one of Australia's most attractive Regions, blending city and country lifestyle in an amazing warm temperate climate. Our diverse landscape covers 12,973 square kilometres - from the Great Dividing Range through to the Darling Downs flood plains. 

We are committed to developing a sustainable built environment that is designed for our unique climate and celebrates our legacy as the 'Garden City'.

Toowoomba Region Design - Warm Temperate Climate Building Design Guidelines

The Toowoomba Region Design - Warm Temperate Climate Building Design Guidelines help homeowners, commercial property owners and renters, in rural and central Toowoomba, design new buildings that complement our climate. The document provides design tips to improve energy efficiency and prepare your new building for changing climate conditions, while maintaining our rich history and distinctive character.

We have invested in these guidelines to ensure great design outcomes for the Toowoomba Region. The Warm Temperate Climate Building Design Guidelines is the first output from the Toowoomba Region Design series.

Read more about the Warm Temperate Climate Building Design Guidelines.

Toowoomba Region Urban Design Initiative

We created the Toowoomba Region Urban Design Initiative (TRUDI) program to raise awareness and understanding of urban design. Urban design is multi-faceted and can be hard to describe, but in simple terms, urban design is about making better places. 

Reasons for the TRUDI program

The TRUDI program was developed to support visions noted in the following plans:

1. Toowoomba Regional Community PlanThe Toowoomba Regional Community Plan (2010) includes a vision that begins: 'In the year 2050…The Toowoomba Region has the best of city and country.' The community plan includes many strategies concerned with the design of our city, suburbs and rural towns. It promotes ‘self-containment’, local identity and character, more compact patterns of development and safety through design. It recognises the influence of urban design in supporting healthy lifestyles. The community plan also calls for housing diversity and better affordability, and emphasises the region’s network of towns.

2. Planning Scheme: The 2012 Regional Planning Scheme follows up the directions mentioned in the community plan, identifying three big planning challenges for the region: 

  • the increase of residential densities in Toowoomba City, Highfields and to a lesser extent the rural towns. 
  • create greater diversity in housing
  • the creation of neighbourhoods where residents can walk/cycle to work, school, shops and services and parks. 

3. Toowoomba City Centre Master Plan: The Toowoomba City Centre Master Plan has also set the goal and aspiration of creating ‘a thriving place that is truly the heart of the region’. Practicing good urban design is one of the ways in which these goals can be realised.

TRUDI policy

The Urban Design Policy and Practice in the Toowoomba Region outlines the program results to date as well as next steps moving forward. It includes: 

  • Toowoomba Regional Council’s new urban design policy (page 3) 
  • an explanation of our urban design approach (page 4) 
  • urban design priorities for the Toowoomba region (page 5) 
  • practical implementation measures the council intends to pursue in the future (page 7).