How high will it go? $1.6bn Brisbane stadium plan could blow out

Re-purposing a near 50-year-old stadium as the Brisbane Olympics main athletics hub could blow out past the estimated $1.6bn cost, with the Queensland government yet to complete a business case for the project.

Queensland Premier Steven Miles and Minister Grace Grace during a media conference, Brisbane. Picture: Liam Kidston

Re-purposing a near 50-year-old stadium as the Brisbane Olympics main athletics hub could blow out past the estimated $1.6bn cost, with the Queensland government yet to complete a business case for the project.

Plans to rebuild The Gabba as Brisbane’s main Olympic stadium were dropped in March, with Premier Steven Miles instead planning to spend $1.6bn upgrading the ageing Queensland Sport and Athletics Centre, previously known as QEII stadium.

Fronting budget estimates on Wednesday, State Development director general Graham Fraine said a “project validation report” was still under way.

Liberal National Party deputy leader Jarrod Bleijie said The Gabba rebuild was also announced before a project validation report was completed, then scrapped after costs blew out from $1bn to $2.7bn. “So what happens if that occurs again and we are back at square one despite having won the Games three years ago?” he said.

“Why would the project validation report or due diligence not have occurred by the department to make recommendations to government before the (QSAC) announcement was made?

Mr Fraine said the forecast cost for the project was “in the vicinity of $1.6bn”. “That is the amount that will be tested through the project validation report work,” he said.

An independent review of options for Brisbane 2032, led by former lord mayor Graham Quirk, in March found revamping QSAC would be a waste of money and proposed a new $3.4bn stadium at Victoria Park, on the fringe of Brisbane’s CBD.

On Mr Quirk’s numbers, $600m would be spent building 14,000 permanent seats at QSAC and a further $1bn to increase ­capacity to 40,000 with ­related infrastructure.

State Development Minister Grace Grace said project validation reports usually took six to 12 months. “These are best estimates in relation to what we have and what we’ve done in the past when we did the intergovernmental agreement,” she said.

“There’s been no PVR on Victoria Park either. And I note that the opposition has supported all of the venues that the government has said that we will be going ahead with.”