Flashback: $50m Gold Coast dinosaur theme park proposed in 1999 by special effects wizard John Cox

Imagine coming face-to-face with dinosaurs. A $50 million theme park with that in mind was unveiled for a northern Gold Coast site offering a water park and theatre.

GRAND plans for a $50 million dinosaur theme park at a northern Gold Coast site were unveiled as the silver bullet to boosting the city’s tourism offerings.

Proposed by Academy Award-winning special effects wizard John Cox, Footprints Discovery Park was to become the city’s first new theme park since the opening of Movie World in 1991.

But despite an enthusiastic reaction when it was unveiled 20 years ago this week, it never came to be.

John Cox with his creatures for his planned Footprints Discovery Theme Park proposed for the Gold Coast in 1999

Today, Gold Coasters are eagerly watching on as planning and assessment continues on a $600 million proposed theme park at Carrara.

Australian Legends World, put forward by Chinese developer Songcheng, will feature an indoor ski field, animal exhibits and adventure park along with a 3500-seat performance theatre and is expected to create thousands of jobs during its construction.

It is one of several new theme parks proposed for sites across the city in the past decade.

But Mr Cox’s idea came before all those.

It was February 1999 – John Howard was Prime Minister, Savage Garden were heating up the charts and, with the Millennium approaching, the Gold Coast was looking for a bold new idea.

John Cox with his Oscar.

And it was found in the imagination of the man who had won an Academy Award for the special effects of the 1995 film Babe.

The then-Labrador-based animatronics expert filed a development application with the Gold Coast City Council for a vacant 38.7ha site in Pimpama.

The site, with a 1.5km highway frontage, had room for future expansion, with plans for accommodation and a conference centre.

It was expected to hold more than 6000 people at any one time with up to 500 jobs to be created.

Mr Cox told the Bulletin at the time that the park would “test imaginations”.

“The park is an outdoor discovery park,” he said.

“There are a number of rides, but the majority of attractions are interactive.

A map of the proposed park in 1999.

“Most of the park is outdoors and it’s all there for children to discover and use their imaginations.”

The father of two said it was aimed at children.

“There are a lot of things kids don’t get to experience anymore,” he said.

“Video games and television takes up a lot of their time and they forget that they’ve got imaginations and they can make up everything.”

Mr Cox spent $4.25 million buying the land, which sat between Yawalpah Rd and Old Pacific Hwy.

It was welcomed by city leaders, including councillors David Power and Jan Grew.

“I think it’s a marvellous concept and I’m sure the people in the area will be very supportive of it,” Cr Power said.

Artist impression of Songcheng’s proposed theme park at Carrara which is now under consideration. Imaged supplied by Canford Property Group

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Mr Cox hoped to begin construction in mid-1999 and open the park in November 2000.

But despite the backing of political leaders, the project failed to gain investors.

Councillors signed off on the development in September 1999 and the search for financial backers began.

But by 2005 the project was dead in the water and Mr Cox turned his attention to creating smaller experiences.

That year he opened his How to Make a Monster exhibit at the Queensland Museum.

“Julie and I attended a convention in America two years ago about the state of the theme park industry,’’ he told the Bulletin at the time

“Somebody who was trying to get a theme park off the ground, similar to ours, said if people weren’t willing to jump on your idea, to think smaller and repackage.

“One of the attractions we had in Footprints Discovery Park was an old theatre house with an exhibition inside called How to Make a Monster.

“I was sitting there and this little light just instantly went off and I thought ‘let’s pull that exhibition out’.”