When my newsagent told me that they had been served with a resumption notice to allow for a new busway I assumed it was for a road widening and might involve some of their carpark. They are on Old Cleveland Road at Coorparoo, which is one of Brisbane’s major arterials. “No,” Chris told me, “it involves the whole of the shop. “This is at the rear of us.”
That couldn’t be a serious proposal I thought, as I paid the bill, and filed it to follow-up later. Well, apparently it is, as revealed in today’s Courier Mail. There are two options being considered. One of which involves resumption of hundreds of houses and some parkland, construction of tunnels and flyovers, and possibly the relocation of my local newsagents. If you have broadband, or are very patient, you can download the map from here (pdf 1.72mb).
The design looks like it is meant to work in with the designation in the South-East Queensland Regional Plan of the Coorparoo area where I live as a TOD (Transit Oriented Development), which is defined as “Mixed-use residential and commercial areas, designedto maximise the efficient use of land through high levels of access to public transport”.
That means that Coorparoo will become a high-density residential node, which will involve some high-rise apartment blocks, if the desired densities are to be reached.
All of this is quite problematic for the local Labor member Gary Fenlon, and hence for his boss, Peter Beattie.
Fenlon originally won the seat appealing to NIMBYs with a campaign on local traffic issues, which included retention of an archaic and dangerous railway level crossing. (Declaration: I was the Liberal candidate at the time.)
At the next election he held the seat, despite a transport issue involving making the local rail line dual-gauge to accommodate large interstate diesel trains.
This proposal is more disruptive than anything proposed before, and coupled with the TOD will make Coorparoo unrecognisable from what it is now.
Fenlon lost Greenslopes in 1995 when Wayne Goss was still popular and there were no substantial local issues. At the same election, Goss also lost some seats that were impacted by a traffic issue – the so-called “Koala Road”. (Declaration: I wasn’t the Liberal candidate that time – I was running the Liberal Party state campaign.)
These proposals have got to make Greenslopes a potential win for the Liberal Party. They could also have flow-on impacts on the neighbouring seat of South Brisbane, just as the Koala Road had some flow-on effects more broadly than just the affected seats.
Now would be a good time for the Liberals to preselect a candidate for Greenslopes – they should be able to attract a high calibre field with this issue in the open. (Declaration: I have no interest in the preselection!)