Toondah plans submitted for environmental assessment in 2015 and the new slightly revised version.

Toondah plans submitted for environmental assessment in November 2015 and the slightly revised May 2017 version.

Toondah Harbour is the subject of letters to Redlands2030 this week, following Walker Group’s decision to submit a new proposal for environmental assessment.

The previous project referral was submitted 17 months ago and it seems that the Federal Government didn’t like it. The revised plan doesn’t seem to have changed much.

It seems that a game is being played but only the Government and the Walker Group know the rules.  Is the community is being left on the sidelines? Local councillors seem to be out of the loop.

Toondah questions

Toondah Harbour

Toondah Harbour

Dear R2030

The Toondah PDA is not about an updated ferry terminal but a new highrise suburb.

What is Walker Group’s history with this form of massive high rise development? What cost is there to the rate payers if Walkers have financial difficulties?

Who owns the ocean floor, and is it a gift to Walkers? This area is supposed to be protected – the area is beautiful.

This proposed development is not about tourism, it is just another massive residential development.  People come to Cleveland and Straddie  to enjoy  the area. Toondah PDA offers nothing of what people come here for.

My suggestions for Toondah are a jetty  and a nice cafe and better parking and some upgraded port facilities. Sadly, most people don’t understand what is proposed and what will be lost if this goes ahead.

MF
CLEVELAND

Open letter to Minister Frydenberg

Dear Editor of Redlands2030

Please find attached my letter to Minister Frydenderg regarding the Toondah Harbour PDA. I hope your readers will consider making a like plea.

Dear Minister I am disgusted, disillusioned and saddened by, as we see it, the arrogance of the Walker Corporation in manipulating your Department into giving them six referral decision suspensions over a period of 18 months for a decision that should have been made in 20 days. This has allowed the Walker Corporation to access community submissions, withdraw their original referral and present a new one some 400 pages in length (including attachments) with the expectation that the community will comment within 10 days and your decision will be given in 20 days.  These timeframes are totally inappropriate for such a massive residential project that should never have been considered for Moreton Bay in the first place.

We have many talented experts in the Redlands who are appalled that 3,600 dwellings might be built IN Moreton Bay, a bay, which our Mayor says is “our greatest asset” (ABC News 23 December 2015).  This residential area on reclaimed land would destroy the Bay’s wetlands, mudflats and mangroves, which protect the coastline, and would allow people to walk, at low tide, to Cassim Island, the migratory bird habitat.  Surely the RAMSAR agreement and State Marine Park legislation by their very nature should protect this whole area from devastation!

All the community wants is an upgraded Ferry Terminal and facilities to encourage tourism, most of which is for Stradbroke Island.  Tourists will not benefit from, nor will they appreciate, 3,600 dwellings IN Moreton Bay when they come to the area to experience the bird life, the koalas and the natural beauty and peacefulness of the whole bay area.

Once the fragile coastal environment is disturbed and gone it can never be replaced.  Once damage is done by 20 years of construction and dredging, which will be continual and a cost forever on the local community, our ecosystem is destroyed.  Hasn’t there been enough damage already done to Moreton Bay’s wetlands, flora and fauna! 

We understand that New South Wales, Victoria and Tasmania would not even consider such a high risk development which would destroy their coastal environments.

Please, Minister, do your job and protect our environment.

Sincerely,

JD
Cleveland QLD 4163

A fraud being imposed on community

Weinam Creek Priority Development Area

Editor Redlands2030

As a resident of the Redlands community for 26 years, I marvel at the “any growth is good” mindset of the Redland City Council.

Alas I cannot say the same for the gushing and rushed endorsement of the Weinam Creek and Toondah Harbour PDAs  as this was without caveats. This endorsement has flowed from the hollow mantra of “jobs for our children”; “jobs jobs jobs”, “open for business” and, of course, “putting Redlands on the map”.

Where was there any mention of protecting the quality of life, lifestyle and liveability of existing and future residents?

The Toondah plans now being pushed at the federal government are out of step with the community’s expressed views in the Toondah consultation, but worse, the PDAs are an assault on the Redlands Community Plan AND the Redlands Planning Scheme.

The Weinam PDA looks like a dead duck…but nobody wants to admit it!

Surely the current crop of Councillors have enough respect for the community that they will call a halt to the fraud being imposed on our community…at least some of them should do something about “protecting community values” after all they are very quick to say that community consultation has been done and the voice of the residents has been heard…as yet we are still awaiting evidence of being listened to!

CM
Cleveland

Send your letter to Redlands2030

If you have something to say about anything of interest to people in the Redlands you can send us a letter by emailing:

theeditor@redlands2030.net

Letters published by Redlands2030 – 17 May 2017

Dennis Tafe, Jun 12, 2017

We need to hold our state and federal politicians to account and if they do not listen to the electorate they lose office. We only need to look back at the last Queensland State Election. Both Campbell Newman and Jeff Seeney scoffed at out concerns for the GBR and for our coastal environment. As a result the LNP were booted out. If the Palaszczuk State Government cannot learn from the mistakes of their opposition they will need to be treated in exactly the same way.

Erica Siegel, Jun 12, 2017

yes , agreed, Dennis Tafe but it is a bit too late after it is approved. This is Campbell Newman and Jeff Seeney’s mess, the Newman Government declared the Toondah harbour area a PDA with encouragement from Mayor Williams. The Newman Government has been booted out but we are still dealing with the mess they created. Regrettably we cannot boot out their mess with them, not like with Goss and his highway through Koala country. He was booted out before it got off the ground.
This is already a PDA…that has to be undone !

Me Too, Jun 13, 2017

Yes, Dennis. Which party to vote for ?
They are both in on it.
So, votes in getting rid of the PDA? They wouldn’t …
Yes, Goss lost it but it put the others in.
But when all of the engineering costs of this travesty add up maybe Walker will think again.
But real estate profit will win over the day.
Council may need to request PDA removal when the true costs to ratepayers now and in the future are looked at.
But what the community wants doesn’t seem to carry any weight.
Right on, Erica!
Fix the port, stop the rort, sort the PDA!

Me Too, Jun 12, 2017

“The Toondah PDA is not about an updated ferry terminal but a new highrise suburb.” (MF Cleveland)
Yes MF!
It’s looking more like a “ferry terminal” update is needed rather than a “Harbour”. Brisbane’s Lord Mayor Quirk is already putting on money for Brisbane River as the gateway to Moreton Bay, including Straddie.
Did we have to promise all that marine area just so Walker could build a new suburb? It’s not really about the ferry terminal. Were the eyes of the Council and State Govt too big for their tummies?
Leave Cleveland alone.
Then tourists might come here from Straddie on their way home to see our natural and unspoilt coastline, birds and koalas.

Erica Siegel, Jun 12, 2017

Tourists will most certainly not come to see yet another high rise development and marina, get real
, this is the age of eco-tourism !!

Dennis Tafe, May 22, 2017

The councillors of Redland City Council (RCC) totally ignored the Council Heritage listing of the Grandview Hotel, the oldest licensed hotel in Queensland and they also ignored the height restriction (3 floors). I know that a couple of them were over-ruled. If this is what we can expect from our RCC councillors on a small development what can we expect on the Toondah Harbour Proposal, which appears to have been submitted by a couple of school children. It is not even in the right place and it definitely does nothing for tourism. Dr Dennis Tafe

Kees Hulsman, May 20, 2017

I have been reading and evaluating the environmental assessment of the proposed Toondah Harbour development. The approach is extremely reductionist in the assessment does largely focus on the development’s impact on the immediate area. That is well and good but should it not also consider the overall impacts it and other developments will have on the environmental assets of Moreton Bay?
The approach of our politicians has been that when an area has deteriorated so much that there has been a significant decrease in biodiversity, then rather than taking steps to rehabilitate the area or allow it to recover, what they do is delist it from the RAMSAR site. Since each cut is considered in isolation, the decision makers do not get an overview of what is happening to the environmental health of the Bay.
This approach may make for easy decision making, but it is woeful policy and practice because there will not be the necessary balance between development and natural environment values.
The Western side of the Bay has been dying for the past 30 years. It is death by a thousands cuts.
The proposed Toondah Harbour Development will make a few more cuts.

Elizabeth Brennan, May 18, 2017

Please do not sell off our precious shore at Toondah Harbour. Once a developer gets their hand on
it, it has gone forever. The birds and wild life are plentiful at the shore and are a delight to watch
amongst the mangroves. The shore line around the world has dwindled in massive proportions, don’t let it happen at Toondah!

Linda White, May 17, 2017

The ‘revamped’ Toondah proposal smacks of putting lipstick on a pig. It amazed me that the environmental effects of this project on migratory birds and Ramsar sites is only now being investigated. It should have been the first thing looked at and then, maybe, this monster wouldn’t have passed ‘Go’!

Erica Siegel, May 18, 2017

this is what the Walker Group thinks of threatened species in the PDA
copied from the new referral 2017-/7939
Declining numbers year on year are mainly
associated with disruption in staging sites in
other parts of the flyway. In this case, the loss
of a relatively small area of intertidal feeding
habitat is unlikely to lead to a corresponding
reduction in the number of migratory shorebirds
using Moreton Bay. Impacts are not expected to
be significant and a number of management
measures will be put in place to mitigate any
indirect impacts

Erica Siegel, May 20, 2017

Well said, Kees, just consider the mud plumes, from digging the marina, being carried by the currents /tides near and far, smothering sea grass beds and coral.
There is no way to stop it, no environmental controls will prevent it.
The damage far reaching for marine life..

Erica Siegel, May 17, 2017

In reply to MF Cleveland “Who owns the ocean floor, and is it a gift to Walkers? ”
I asked from Minister Jacky Trad the very same question on 28.April 2016 and after repeatedly reminding her I required an answer I at last got a reply. The ocean floor is owned be the State and
” The Walker Group will fund and construct the aforementioned community infrastructure for the benefit of the community and at no cost to the council or the state. As part of the commercial agreement they provide this in return for development rights over government owned land.”

Toni, May 17, 2017

Erica. Actually just thinking of the statement “no cost to council or state”. This application for 3600 units plus commercial plumb a marina plus the ferry terminal would usually have fees paid to Council for assessment but as it is now given the golden handshake by the state as a PDA i wonder who accesses it or is it just open slather, do what you want planning. Usually developers have to pay $28,009 infrastructure change on each unit so wondering if that will be given a relaxation but at he end of the day staff somewhere will have to assess it I hope and the exit on the island of mud will have to be upgraded to accommodate cars for 10,000 people. Can the sewerage treatment plants handle another 10,000 people who were not even allowed for in a planning scheme or regional plan. All these concerns also relate to Weinam Creek as the Walker team are getting that as a gift from state and council to do what they wish on more coastal foreshore, when do we hear about that little gem

Erica Siegel, May 17, 2017

I have as many questions and as few answers as you do, Toni

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