Townsville Eats prepares for 10,000 strong crowd to flock to Flinders Street

After a monster crowd turned up to the last Townsville Eats, Townsville City Council have thrown a huge effort behind making this one bigger and better.

The first Townsville Eats festival was a success, with thousands attending. Photo: Supplied

AFTER  a monster crowd turned up to the last Townsville Eats, Townsville City Council has thrown a huge effort behind making tonight’s event bigger and better.

More than 10,000 people turned up to the Flinders St food event last month to the surprise of food vendors and council staff who organised the monthly attraction.

Cr Ann-Maree Greaney said organisers were “overwhelmed” with the turnout, which resulted in long lines and hungry people after food trucks sold out quickly.

“We were so excited it was that popular and it just goes to show that if we put on a good event people will come along,” Cr Greaney said.

She said staff had worked hard behind the scenes to make improvements for the second edition of the event to kick off at 5pm today.

“There’s a new layout that will be introduced which will sort of spread the crowd into three zones,” Cr Greaney said.

“There will be more food trucks and a greater selection of food and we have a live entertainment stage set up.”

Keeping in line with the Italian theme, movies will be played on the open-air cinema as well as a spaghetti bolognese eating competition.

Damien Pattel from Donna Bionda has agreed to dish up the Italian favourite for the competition.

“We’re allocating about 250g of spag bol for each entrant,” Mr Pattel said. “It’s a bit of fun that adds to the event.”

Mr Pattel said his staff learned a lot from the previous event and were eager to get this one under way.

“We’re really confident we’ve stepped up our products and obviously doubled the number of food items,” he said.

“We’re still going to run some classics that we have in house all the time but we’re also going for a winter feel with some additions to our menu.

“We’ll have entrees, mains and desserts available this time.”

The large turnout of people to last month’s event has injected confidence back into the CBD, Cr Greaney said it was a positive sign of what’s ahead.

“Council is always looking at ways to activate the CBD but this sort of gives us an indication of what’s going to happen in the future and what council can potentially provide when the stadium opens up,” Cr Greaney said.

A park and ride service will be set up from 4pm to midnight, shuttling patrons to and from the Dean St carpark.

Originally published as Townsville Eats prepares for 10,000 strong crowd to flock to Flinders Street