City's modern heart is beset by age-old forces

THE youthful city heart of fast-growing Queensland has been overwhelmed by natural forces as old as time.

THE youthful city heart of fast-growing Queensland has been overwhelmed by natural forces as old as time.

Slowly but inexorably, after swamping the regions and punching through the city's western flank, the flood of 2011 has finally laid siege to the capital.

Softened by a month of regional flooding, Brisbane residents were shocked by the ferocity of an instant inland tsunami that explode don Monday and, finally, panicked by torrential rains that have overwhelmed the city's flood defences.

By midday yesterday, Brisbane's commercial precinct -- where finance houses tower over high-priced, up-market restaurants -- was all but deserted.

Police tape blocked access to the lower decks of the Harry Seidler-designed trophy address, Riparian Plaza, where water was lapping around the table legs on the promenade.

Football legend John Ribot was pacing the footpaths, trying to put the latest flood warnings into context, given the enormity of the 1974 flood that has defined Brisbane's identity as a river city.

A brass plaque attached to the colonial-fronted Polo Club showed the historic flood level, an ominous warning of how much the waters still had to rise to match it. The famous Eagle Street Pier was empty.

At Cha Cha Chas -- a gastronomic city institution -- the doors were locked and the windows were fogged.

Yellow caution tape stopped gawkers from approaching the riverfront promenade, which in sunnier times hosts the popular weekend markets.

City businesses were told to close at midday so workers would get home, prompting chaos on the roads.

At Southbank, the city's faux beach and recreation hub, ferry services were cancelled and walkways rose precariously on a swollen river, with pontoons ready to unhitch from pylons.

The giant ferris wheel that has replaced Stephan's Expo 88 coloured needle or spire as Southbank's gaudy attention-grabber is dwarfed only by cranes working to complete the long-time-coming Southbank transformation.

Brisbane has changed a lot since the last great flood in 1974.

New office and residential towers with external skeletons pepper the city with an enthusiasm that will be sorely challenged by the unfolding disaster.

But despite the new architecture, Brisbane has maintained its sense of place.

The new footbridge, built in the shadow of the new gallery of modern art and library, is topped with spires that -- given a river swollen to bursting point -- look for all the world like a floating surge of tangled driftwood.