Future of new McDonald’s Toowoomba restaurant at Harlaxton up in the air after council defers decision

A proposal for a new 24-hour fast-food restaurant along a residential street in Toowoomba is up in the air, after a number of issues were raised by councillors about the project.

PROPOSED: Concept art for a planned McDonald's restaurant on Ruthven St in North Toowoomba.

The future of Toowoomba’s newest McDonald’s restaurant is in doubt, with the council delaying its decision after a litany of issues were highlighted by objectors.

Councillors voted at Wednesday’s special meeting to defer the approval of the new 24-hour drive-through outlet, slated for the corner of Ruthven and Jones Streets in Harlaxton.

A prominent council officer was one of several submitters against the project, which was first proposed in 2021 on a parcel that had previously hosted several residential properties.

On top of sitting directly opposite Harlaxton State School and next door to Northpoint Shopping Centre, the new outlet would neighbour several other houses.

Reel Planning’s Kieran Ryan, who was contracted to assess the development application, recommended the project be approved, arguing the applicant’s reports had met all concerns the council shared about its impacts.

But top council engineer Dave Quinlan, who owns two properties fronting Wattle Street and was not speaking as a council employee, lashed both the project and the development proposal as being damaging to the surrounding area and containing several areas.

Chief among his concerns were traffic management, acoustic amenity and stormwater.

“Really, it’s a fairly poor level of detailed assessment when we can’t even get the actual heights right (of acoustic fencing),” Mr Quinlan said.

“It’s pretty ordinary, but it gets better, they didn’t actually include the traffic report (with the pack given to the councillors).

“(Based on the traffic report, they say) you can sneak out with your car and you have to move onto the tarmac so you can see to the west.

“If you paint a line there and it’s only a local street, you can almost get away with that, but you can’t in this (area) because now you’ve go the left hand turn lane (on Jones Street as part of intersection changes), so people are going to head east, swing to the left and create an accident.

“If it looks unsafe, it is unsafe.”

DIVIDED: A proposed McDonald's restaurant on Ruthven Street, which would sit directly opposite Harlaxton State School, has divided residents.

Mr Quinlan made an offer to sell his two houses to the applicant to better facilitate the flow of stormwater from the site as well as pedestrian access.

Council officers acknowledged there were some errors with some of the mapping, but assuring the acoustic modelling was sound.

Councillors like Carol Taylor took aim at the both the economic and community necessity of another McDonald’s restaurant in Toowoomba.

“This area would be perfect (for housing) — we’re worrying about the housing crisis, this area is perfect for medium density housing, it’s close to parks, schools and it’s already serviced by a shopping centre,” she said.

“I don’t believe any reasonable person would agree this is the extension of the commercial centre.

“How can we ignore a perfect potential for medium density residential to make it a fast-food joint?”

Councillor Bill Cahill moved to reject the application, saying the impacts on the surrounding neighbours were too great.

“I suspect if I was living in one of those two houses (next to the site), I’d be dreaming about fries with everything, not from the cars but the loudspeakers,” he said.

“It’s a challenge, I’d hate to be living there.”

His motion was not successful, but councillors eventually agreed to defer the decision so officers could clarify all the issues raised.