Pakenham Station

Pakenham Station was shaped through an extensive, highly collaborative design process. From the outset, Genton worked closely with the North Western Program Alliance — comprising Metro Trains Melbourne, Level Crossing Removal Project, John Holland and KBR, and Tract Landscape Architects. Genton envisioned a gateway station defined by openness, safety, and community connection.

To realise this concept, our team built on previous experience to maintain sufficient weather protection requirements while reducing the facades. By eliminating conventional facades, we created a transparent station that welcomes daylight, encourages natural ventilation, and offers uninterrupted visibility across every platform. The result is a bright, inviting environment that lowers crime risk and helps commuters feel inherently secure.

Pioneering digital fabrication was central to realising this vision. The team used advanced computer-controlled manufacturing to build the roof from reinforced thermoset, minimising waste, reducing secondary steel, and dramatically lowering embodied carbon. This was Australia’s first use of such technology in a live rail environment, executed with millimetre precision to avoid disrupting daily train operations.

Throughout, Indigenous co-design played a pivotal role, embedding local stories of Bunjil the Eagle and traditional eel traps into the architecture and landscape. This process ensured the station does more than acknowledge Country — it invites daily interaction with culture.

Ultimately, the project exceeded the brief by delivering more than an upgraded station. It created new public realm with enhanced connectivity through paths and bike networks and established a dynamic landmark gateway to Pakenham and Gippsland. The result is a beautifully executed, future-focused station that elevates infrastructure into a catalyst for community, culture, and environmental leadership.

Pakenham Station exemplifies design excellence by elevating an infrastructure brief into an inspiring civic place, prioritising functionality, safety, inclusivity, beauty, and environmental leadership. Its radically transparent, open-air design maximises daylight, airflow, and sightlines, fostering a powerful sense of openness and inherent safety. Users feel secure and connected to the broader landscape, transforming what could be an impersonal transport space into an uplifting daily experience.

Accessibility is foundational. Clear pedestrian and cycling paths link seamlessly with the station, bus interchange, carparks, and Pakenham’s town centre. Wayfinding is intuitive, with uninterrupted views that guide passengers instinctively. Generous platform and concourse spaces accommodate large crowds comfortably, while the colonnade of slender columns and vast roof canopy evoke a civic grandeur more typical of major airports than suburban stops.

Aesthetically, the floating roof and undulating bronze soffit — referencing Gippsland’s golden hills — have created a landmark that anchors local identity. The restrained material palette and elliptical skylights focus attention upward, heightening the experience of arrival and departure. By treating the station as a civic gateway rather than a utilitarian structure, the design elevates everyday journeys into moments of delight.

Sustainability and quality underpin every decision. The digitally fabricated roof system used far fewer raw materials, cut embodied carbon, and achieved precise, durable construction. Indigenous narratives aren’t token gestures but deeply embedded: large-scale eel trap patterns animate shared paths, while Bunjil’s feather engravings invite tactile engagement, fostering an authentic dialogue with Country.

By integrating advanced construction, cultural meaning, social safety, and striking architectural expression, Pakenham Station sets a new benchmark for Victoria. It vividly demonstrates that investing in professional design creates infrastructure that is not just fit-for-purpose, but profoundly improves quality of life, enriches cultural connection, and strengthens community pride — an example for Australia and beyond.

Pakenham Station tackled a pressing challenge — how to elevate rail infrastructure from purely functional to socially, culturally, and environmentally transformative — through several genuine design firsts. Most notably, it pioneered the use of digitally fabricated reinforced thermoset in a live rail environment, a first in Australia.

This cutting-edge manufacturing process replaced traditional steel-heavy construction with a lighter, precision-engineered system. It cut raw material use, slashed embodied carbon, and delivered exacting millimetre accuracy, enabling rapid, disruption-free installation over operating train lines. Beyond reducing waste, it showcased how architects can harness aerospace-grade technology to deliver more sustainable, expressive public infrastructure, redefining what’s possible for rail design worldwide.

Architecturally, the decision to remove station facades entirely was radical. Unlike typical elevated stations enclosed by walls, Genton’s design leverages Pakenham’s unique open surrounds to deliver a fully transparent typology. This maximises passive surveillance, daylight, and ventilation, dramatically improving safety and comfort.

The soaring, wave-like roof, crafted via advanced parametric modelling, anchors the station visually, while higher balustrades and carefully tiered glass protect against winds, offering curated panoramic views. This shifts the commuter experience from merely transiting through infrastructure to actively enjoying the journey.

Together, these breakthroughs show innovation isn’t just about new technologies; it’s about rethinking how infrastructure can minimise environmental impact and enrich user experience. Pakenham Station thus stands as a trailblazing model, proving that with courageous, user-centred, and culturally sensitive thinking, rail projects can achieve outcomes once thought out of reach.

The impact of Pakenham Station reaches far beyond transport efficiency, setting a new paradigm for how infrastructure can strengthen communities, regenerate urban fabric, and model environmental responsibility.

Socially, the project reunites Pakenham’s township by replacing divisive level crossings with a 2.5km elevated rail, freeing new parklands beneath. This dramatically increases public space for recreation, fitness, gathering, and play, transforming previously severed urban zones into thriving, safe, connected precincts. The transparent station design amplifies passive surveillance, reducing crime risk and making people feel secure around the clock. Integration with pedestrian and bike paths, plus direct connections to shops and services, revitalises the town centre, fostering economic growth and social vitality.

Culturally, the project’s profound Indigenous co-design sets a benchmark for authentic engagement. By embedding Bunurong stories into tactile details and large-scale landscapes, the station becomes a daily invitation to engage with Country, reshaping how infrastructure can honour First Nations histories and futures.

Environmentally, the project’s innovations directly support circular economy principles. Digital fabrication minimised waste by tailoring materials precisely to design needs, reducing offcuts and eliminating tonnes of secondary steel. The lighter roof system cuts embodied carbon, while extensive landscaping along the corridor improves biodiversity, incorporates large canopy trees, and uses water-sensitive urban design to restore natural systems.

This positions Victoria as a leader in future-focused rail architecture, blending cutting-edge sustainability, technological ingenuity, and cultural storytelling. By proving that transport projects can simultaneously drive environmental action, urban regeneration, and profound social connection, Pakenham Station sets a bold new standard for infrastructure’s role in shaping healthier, more resilient communities.

Pakenham Station exemplifies circular and sustainable design by embedding reduced material use, waste minimisation, biodiversity gains and long-term community regeneration right from the design phase.

The project’s most ground-breaking achievement was pioneering Australia’s first use of digitally fabricated reinforced thermoset in a live rail environment. By tailoring components with aerospace precision, this process drastically cut material offcuts and eliminated tonnes of secondary steel. The lighter structure reduced embodied carbon, transport emissions and installation energy, directly advancing circular economy objectives.

Sustainability principles guided every scale of the project. At the urban level, elevating the rail line removed three congested level crossings and unlocked open space. This new green corridor reconnects the township, creates vibrant habitat for local species, and provides extensive tree canopy, critical for urban cooling, carbon absorption and improving microclimates.

Water-sensitive urban design was embedded across the corridor, restoring natural hydrology and supporting local ecosystems. Equally, the station’s transparent, façade free typology reduces reliance on energy-intensive mechanical ventilation and artificial lighting, harnessing natural daylight and cross-ventilation to lower operational energy demand. The design also anticipates future adaptability: by minimising heavy enclosures and using modular digital fabrication, the station’s primary structures can be more easily upgraded or repurposed, extending lifecycle value and reducing future demolition waste.

From an ethical perspective, the project prioritised Indigenous co-design from the outset, ensuring cultural sustainability by embedding local Bunurong stories into daily commuter journeys, connecting community identity with place in a deeply enduring way.

By integrating innovative low-impact construction, regenerative landscape design and cultural longevity, Pakenham Station does more than tick environmental boxes. It demonstrates how circular thinking at the design stage can yield infrastructure that conserves resources, revitalises ecosystems, strengthens social fabric and builds climate resilience—showcasing a powerful, holistic model of sustainable design leadership for Victoria and beyond.