What's happening

In April 2020, council launched community engagement around the development of the Crafers Village Design Guidelines. The aim behind developing the Guidelines, was to return Crafers main street to its village community origins.

At the Council Meeting on the 15 December 2020, Council endorsed the Crafers Village Design Guidelines, and this marked the final key milestone in their development. Since endorsement, the Crafers Village Design Guidelines have influenced built form and public realm investment within the Crafers Village area.

On this page you will find information about the engagement activities that were undertaken during the development of the Guidelines and the range of initiatives that have been implemented since their endorsement. These initiatives range from refurbishment of historic and introduction of new business offerings, a renewed Crafers Hall and tennis courts, increased parking opportunities, improvements to pedestrian safety and main street walkability, a pocket park and a new entry statement.

If you have any specific questions about the project and/or next steps please feel free to leave a question below and we will get back to you.

Crafers Main Street Raised Pedestrian Crossing - March 2026

During design and development of the Crafers Village Design Guidelines, our community requested important improvements to slow vehicles accelerating to approach the freeway and enable pedestrian connections on both sides of the main street.

At the Council Meeting on 28 May 2024, a Motion on Notice was endorsed for the CEO to engage with the Department of Infrastructure and Transport (DIT) to establish the feasibility of and requirements to deliver, a raised pedestrian crossing on the Crafers Main Street, in front of the Crafers Hotel where the existing pedestrian crossing is positioned.

After this meeting, DIT staff assessed the proposed location to ensure it met all required standards for this traffic intervention and conducted a pedestrian count to ensure the proposed location aligned with pedestrian use of Crafers Main Street.

Funding was secured to proceed with construction of the raised pedestrian crossing in 2025 and site preparations for construction of the crossing begin in March 2026.

Crafers is a major public transport, walking trail and cycling hub – these user groups (and in turn the main street business community) will benefit by the introduction of a speed limit reduction and wombat crossing.

The location of the wombat crossing was selected by traffic engineering analysis as it:

• Is the closest to the existing pedestrian desire line and Pioneer Women’s Trail.
• Avoids additional expense and disruption in lighting and bus stop relocation (which, if relocated further south would have removed further carparks).
• Enables the necessary sight line requirements for wombat crossing, a further west placement and the interaction between pedestrians and the roundabout would be unsafe.

The DIT and Council have sought to find a compromise that delivers on safety and underpins further investment in the vibrancy of the Crafers Main Street. Council will continue to work with all community and main street stakeholders to improve usability – in particular, Council encourages further investment in improving private car park designs and creating connectivity between tenancies and businesses.

Expansion of the Crafers Park'n'Ride - Mid 2024

Following community feedback received through the development of the Guidelines highlighting the need for additional parking within Crafers, Council advocated to the DIT to expand the Park'n'Ride facilities.

As part of the Government’s commitment to improve transport to support growth in Mount Barker and the Adelaide Hills, a new Park ‘n’ Ride facility was built at Crafers featuring 85 new car parking spaces, including two accessible bays and motorcycle parking.

Crafers Welcome Sign - 2024

A new sign was introduced in 2024, welcoming people to the Crafers main street.

Crafers Pocket Park - completed August 2022

In 2020 Council engaged the Crafers community, sports clubs, businesses and visitors to explore the critical issues and opportunities of the Crafers village. Throughout this process the community requested better access and upgrades to public space within Crafers as a top priority in the short to medium term.

Based on the Guidelines, Council secured funding to progress design and installation of a concept plan for a small, underutilised portion of crown owned open space adjacent Crafers main street.

152 community members participated in the community consultation on a concept plan for a small, underutilised portion of crown owned open space adjacent the Crafers main street. All feedback was collated and reviewed, and a concept design was developed. Construction of the Crafers Pocket Park was completed in August 2022.

Community Engagement Summary

You may be interested in reviewing all the community engagement feedback we received during the project, and you can do this by reading through the Crafers Village Design Guidelines Community Engagement Report.

You might also like to view the video below that outlines the key changes to the Guidelines made following feedback received from our community during the second stage of community engagement (July 2020).