Council secretly endorses revised plans for Toondah Harbour port upgrade

Redland City Council has secretly endorsed revised plans for the Toondah Harbour port, with the drastically different proposal now awaiting state approval.

Secret plans to overhaul Toondah Harbour port include adding in an extra 300 car parks and slashing the number of units in tower blocks on the foreshore. Picture: Contributed

The controversial Toondah Harbour port upgrade will now include an extra 300-plus car parks and thousands less apartments, after the local council secretly threw its support behind the ferry terminal upgrade, agreeing to send the plans on to the state government for approval.

Redland City Council this month “quietly” backed Walker Corporation’s revised proposal to overhaul the ferry terminal with the new plans scaling back 3600 apartments on reclaimed land to “about” 900 units in tower blocks on the existing foreshore and allowing dredging to continue.

The council has urged the state to take the lead on the project as a co-ordinated development, ensuring all stakeholders, including the community, are engaged in the consultation process.

In a statement, the council said the information from Walker Corporation was incorrect about it endorsing a revised proposal for the Toondah Harbour development.

“While Council was recently provided with a confidential briefing on a draft concept plan prepared by Walker Corporation as the preferred development partner for the project, the draft plan was not presented for Council endorsement but to seek feedback from Council as a major stakeholder,” the council statement said.

“This is a necessary step in refining a proposed alternative plan. Council decisions are not made in briefings, and any endorsement of new plans would need to take place in a General Meeting of Council.”

The council statement said its vision for Toondah Harbour “remains the same”.

In July it said the terms of the deal would remain confidential “as with any commercial agreement”.

It said its partnership with the Walker Corporation would allow much-needed infrastructure upgrades would be delivered at no long-term cost to council or ratepayers, to create an exciting new destination.

Walker Corporation spokesman Dolan Hayes said the revised plans, initially calculated to cost upwards of $5 billion, were presented to Redland City Council in a private briefing with the council’s secret endorsement made behind closed doors - a claim teh council said was false.

The original plans for Toondah Harbour were secretly discussed in Redland City Council this month. They include cutting back the number of high-rise units to 900. Picture: Walker Corp

He said the additional free car parks would not be in a multistorey carpark with the extra spots to be created after the entire ferry terminal is redesigned.

He said there were currently “about” 600 free parking spaces at the terminal.

Of the new plans, he said: “I don’t want to give a number off the top of my head but it’s 50 per cent more, which would be around close to 1000, I suppose, or close to over 900 free parks.”

“The council maintains the option of building a multistorey car park later … but at this point it’s all just maintained on the current site as part of the development,” he said.

“There’s a lot more space than people think right across that site and it won’t impinge on GJ Walter Park.”

Mr Dolan said the secret revised plans would still be subjected to federal environmental assessments as the project abutted the highly ecologically significant Ramsar wetlands.

However, he said the level of environmental assessment would not be determined until the details were made public.

“Given the fact that Walker had been the lead proponent in the past, there is a strong determination from the council that there be a co-ordinated project with the state so that the state, council and developer are actually in lock-step this time, rather than Walker being out the front trying to peddle the project.”

The secrecy surrounding the council’s support and the new plans drew backlash from community groups, which have called for details of the additional parking spaces along with specifics on the approved number of apartments.

The port at Toondah Harbour is the gateway to North Stradbroke Island. Picture: Judith Kerr

Community advocacy group Redlands2030 said the process had not been transparent with president Steve MacDonald saying he hoped Walker Group would soon publicise its new plans.

“A plan that fixes the ferry terminal precinct without destroying sensitive wetlands, building on parklands, or adversely impacting the site’s migratory wader birds or koala colony has a chance of getting community support, but the devil is in the detail,” Mr MacDonald said.

The revised plans now await the state government’s decision on the necessary planning options and environmental reviews.

Walker Corporation said it was unlikely any construction would start before 2027 if approved with the council’s push for a co-ordinated approach aimed at speeding up the development timeline.

The state government has committed to further community consultation before final approvals are granted with the step expected to be a litmus test of public sentiment, especially after the backlash from the initial mega-tower proposal.