Redlands2030 President Steve MacDonald with a petition about Toondah Harbour development signed by 1,163 people
Redlands2030 and members of the Toondah Action Group gathered 1,163 signatures calling for Redland City Council to withdraw support for the Toondah Harbour development.
The petition was tabled before Council on 22 November by Cr Murray Elliot who received the specially wrapped petition from Steve MacDonald, President of Redlands2030.
Council agreed to accept the petition and have a report presented at a future meeting.
Steve MacDonald, President of Redlands2030 said collecting the petition signatures was a community effort involving dozens of people.
Presenting the petition
The full text of the presentation to Redland City Council reads:
Madam Mayor and councillors
My name is Steve MacDonald.
I live in Cleveland and I am the President of the community group Redlands2030.
I am here to have tabled a petition signed by over 1,136 people, mostly Redlands residents but including a healthy number of visitors and tourists.
This petition calls on the Council to withdraw its support for the Toondah Harbour PDA development, and to work with the State Government to develop a new plan that is focused on upgrading the ferry terminal and associated car parking.
This petition was opened at our last Toondah Rally and on that day alone 426 signatures were collected.
Our long-standing Toondah concerns have centred on poor planning and inadequate community consultation.
Our concern is that Council and the State Government have shown the community nothing to justify the 450% growth in apartments over that previously announced. The unit numbers mysteriously grew from 800 to 3,600, with no explanation and no justification.
The latest planning process ignored previous Toondah schemes, community responses and the promise of a previous State government that Toondah dredging for coastal real estate development will never happen.
Toondah PDA planning never properly addressed policy and legislative commitments to the international Ramsar agreement, migratory bird treaties, the Moreton Bay Marine Park or even the SEQ Regional Plan.
The planning does not address the impacts of a new retail centre on the Cleveland CBD or how a mega residential development with inadequate parking facilities would actually improve access to Straddie.
The much touted extra jobs won’t mitigate the estimated 4500 more commuters leaving Cleveland every day to work elsewhere. If they use the train QR will need an extra 5 trains every peak hour?
Missing from the planning analysis is the impact on schools (two new schools are needed), hospitals and other services. Redlands road traffic congestion has not been fixed, despite many election promises over the years.
The infrastructure agreement shows the public benefits will be minimal under the scheme now before the Commonwealth and it makes no allowance for the subsidy built in by capped infrastructure charges.
The PDA Scheme ignored the Redlands Planning Scheme and the Redlands2030 Community Plan. At the first consultation the responsible planners admitted they had no knowledge of the Community Plan or the Community Values at the start of the PDA consultation.
We have heard many politicians say that “the science should be tested”.
This is nonsense.
Questions of planning merit should be resolved before an Environmental Impact Assessment is undertaken. Environmental assessment should only consider the impacts of a properly considered development.
When the EPBC Referral was replaced with a new proposal it seems council didn’t consider the changes and made no submission. Surely there were matters of public interest that Council were concerned about such as reduced parkland.
The decision of the State Government to terminate the Gold Coast Integrated Resort Development set aside a project much more advanced than Toondah. The commitment to start a master planning process with community participation sets a good precedent. Redlanders should be given similar treatment.
We suggest Council should reflect on the recent measures of public support for the Toondah scheme.
The local paper has a poll showing 85% of readers want the Toondah PDA scheme stopped.
Submissions to the EPBC referral ran 1,400 against and only 8 in favour.
This petition itself, collected by dozens of anxious residents has over 1,100 signatures.
There are others!
These numbers show concern at a level greater than the recent petitions to extend the (eastern) busway, and the stranding of Straddie.
The available evidence shows the community is opposed to the Toondah scheme.
Clearly the proposed development does not have a social licence to go ahead.
Madam Mayor I would like to ask Cr Elliot to accept this petition and ask that he be allowed to table the petition before the Council.
We look forward to hearing what our councilors have to say about a project which the community considers to be clearly unacceptable. We would like the resolution debated in the Chambers so we can hear the views of all Councillors!
We and your petitioners look forward to council’s response.
Put simply, it’s time to stop the rort and just fix the port.
The petition says “withdraw support for Toondah”
The petition
The petition, signed by 1,163 people, says:
We, the undersigned Residents of Redland City request that Council:
- Withdraw its support for Walker Group’s proposed Toondah Harbour residential development which the community considers to be clearly unacceptable
- Work with the State Government on a new plan to upgrade the ferry terminals and associated car parking areas at both Cleveland and Dunwich which:
- Avoids dredging or other environmental harm in the Moreton Bay Marine Park and Ramsar Site
- Protects the local koalas from any loss of habitat and major increase in traffic
- Ensures any development near Toondah Harbour is consistent with the Redland City Plan
Redlands2030 – 23 November 2017
Please note: Offensive or off-topic comments will be deleted. If offended by any published comment please email thereporter@redlands2030.net
4 Comments
Stop the rort. Fix the port.
Absolutely totally affirm the letter’s contents!
If people want high-rise they are already provided for – just look at the holes already undermining Cleveland’s village and the wind-breaking structures being erected in a city that once prided itself on its promise of nothing over 3 stories high, which became 5, which became?? Our shoreline of parklands is so precious, the old trees are jewels in our tiara, but Councillors come and go, and promise and renege. The sound of the chain-saw is heard, the cranes (not the winged ones) appear, and nature weeps at her loss, and so do we.
90% of the long-term residents came here for what the Redlands offered. A life-style envied by the rest of the world. Please, don’t turn Redland City into a hot house environment.
Put simply, on the Toondah proposal to dredge & fill the marine environment to accommodate 3,600 units in apt bldgs — individuals above mentioned cannot possibly go back on their plans with Walker Corp since they paid ‘big bucks’ to Jackie Trad, along with RSC’s all powerful bosses at the top, along with hangers on, which, Birkdale ex-Cr informed me while speaking up for officially listed… on council records… a stand of koala habitat trees by TAFE fence, that the deal was done. Seemingly, Redlands community only learn of deals done, when too late to reverse decisions. Why did Jeff Seeney LNP (now retired) agree so quickly to the Toondah plan? This man approved extending a quarry into virgin bushland, too close for comfort of local resident/s because ‘it’s a resource’. Did he know there were several quarries on the go already in Redlands providing same ‘resource?’ I liken Mr Seeney to ex-Federal MP Bronwyn Bishop who travelled to meeting by helicopter while Mr Seeney, if true, was in the air much of the time being flown by helicopter to and from his home town in style on a daily basis to his Bne MP workplace.
Were any politicians who agreed to the Walker Corp plan with RSC heavyweights aware of the increasing traffic dilemma in Redlands? Did anyone provide them with numbers of deaths and crashes on suburban roads not made for the kind of traffic we see thundering along them today? One new resident commented on seeing increasing numbers of floral roadside arrangements to show where loved ones died….here in Capalaba and Alex Hills where hundreds of new homes are being built and will continue to be built no matter how gridlocked our roads become.
We have had, for decades, a do nothing government when it comes to transport. Why wasn’t rail progressed in 1987 to Redland Bay instead of coming to a dead halt in Cleveland with too little parking for commuters? As for the dedicated bus lane we have been hearing about for many years now, can’t see it happening in the near, or distant future, either.
Steve McDonald, President of 2030 group is right…withdraw the Toondah plan and do what’s right for we, the people of Redlands, by accepting the 1,100+ signatures on petition presented to RSC, and put plans in place to fix the port and parking chaos to provide for a safer environment.
Two days till voting in the Qld State Election. Kim for Labor in the Redlands is a very nice person but she knows that her party is ignoring its own environment policy by supporting the Walker Proposal for an environmentally destructive commercial development beside Toondah Harbour. Matt for the LNP won’t even mention the Walker Proposal because he knows his LNP colleagues, particularly Jeff Seeney, have already fallen in line behind it, as has Jackie Trad, the Mayor of Redland Council and Cr Peter Mitchell. Only two candidates have come out strongly against this poorly planned proposal for 3,600 units, David for the Greens and Peter the Independent. It’s over to us on Saturday.