Gympie council to demolish Gold Mining Museum walkway

Plans to demolish an iconic walkway between the Gympie Mining Museum and poppet head have been met with outrage, although the cost of fixing the 40-year-old structure could run into the millions.

Plans to demolish the iconic walkway at the entrance to the Gympie Mining Museum amid safety fears have been met with outrage and frustration, with one of the site’s senior members saying it should be fixed, not flattened.

The uproar was sparked on Thursday when Gympie Regional Council erected safety fencing around the 50m-long gantry, blocking access from Brisbane Rd to the parking lot at the Lake Alford.

In a statement issued on Thursday afternoon council CEO Robert Jennings said an independent assessment of the gantry had revealed it had “deteriorated significantly and is in danger of collapse”.

He said the report from the assessment recommended “immediate demolition and removal of the whole structure” and the council had fenced it off “to ensure public safety, which remains council’s primary concern”.

A nearby replica mining poppet head, which is linked by the gantry to a cafe at the Mining Museum, would remain “with further investigation to be undertaken to establish what is needed to salvage this important piece of Gympie’s history”.

Plans to demolish a much-loved walkway at the entrance to the Gympie Mining Museum amid safety fears have been met with outrage and frustration, with one of the site’s senior staffers saying it should be fixed, not flattened.

The gantry’s demolition would start “as soon as possible,” Mr Jennings said, and the council had met with a Mining Museum representative on Wednesday to discuss its condition before closing the area off.

Mining Museum and Cafe manager Charlie Horne said on Friday the biggest frustration was the “lack of communication”.

“I just found out when I got to work (Thursday morning) it was happening,” Mr Horne said.

It was no secret the gantry needed work as “four years ago (the council) were told it needs repairs”.

“It’s just a lack of maintenance on their behalf.”

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Plans to demolish a much-loved walkway at the entrance to the Gympie Mining Museum amid safety fears have been met with outrage, although the cost of fixing the 50-year-old structure could like run into millions of dollars.

He was unimpressed by how the week’s events played out.

“I haven’t been officially told anything yet,” he said.

His belief was maintenance of the gantry fell at the council’s feet as members of the Museum had been warned off doing any work themselves.

“They stopped the Museum from doing anything above 2m (like repairs) at flood time,” Mr Horne said.

“I understand that it’s a problem … but it’s been a problem for four years.”

The gantry’s timber supports have been inundated multiple times during floods, including in the near-record 2022 disaster when floodwaters reached only a dozen centimetres below a 5.4m-high vehicle clearance sign hanging from the walkway.

The gantry’s timber supports have been inundated multiple times during floods, including in the near-record 2022 disaster when floodwaters reach only about a dozen centimetres below a 5.4m-high vehicle clearance sign hanging from the walkway.

Replacing it went from “hundreds of thousands to millions in a few years” because no work was ever done to it, Mr Horne said.

He said the cost of repairs was something that should be covered by flood recovery funding.

Mr Jennings said the entire facility was leased to the museum and maintenance of the walkway was under its purview.

He said however the council “acknowledges it needs to be more proactive in assisting community organisations manage their assets” and had created an assistance program to help ensure this happened.

Fixing it was unfortunately not an option due to the “significant deterioration of the support structure”.

“While repairs are often possible, in this case, the extent of the damage made restoration unfeasible,” Mr Jennings said, adding the council had spoken with the Museum about replacing the gantry with a new structure.

The gantry was built in 1985, and neither it nor the “scaled down” poppet head – itself built in 1975 – were heritage listed.

Demolition of the structure is expected to start “within weeks or sooner”, Mr Jennings said.