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Greens councillor calls for ban on flood-prone Brisbane development
By Lucy Stone
Private development should be blocked from Brisbane's inner-city flood plain and such land should be converted to parkland, the Greens say.
Gabba ward councillor Jonathan Sri is calling for a ban on for-profit residential, commercial and mixed-used developments that fall within Brisbane City Council's river and creek flood planning areas.
Brisbane's inner city flooded in 2011.Credit: Paul Harris
The proposal would see large swathes of inner-city suburbs such as West End, New Farm and Teneriffe banned from further development.
The stretch of riverfront land along Montague Road would be converted to parkland or community space.
It would also reserve land for green space through suburbs such as Oxley and Yeronga, though Cr Sri said the Greens were primarily focused on inner-city land.
Brisbane City Council identifies parts of the city that have flooded historically, as well as land that has the chance of flooding.
Greens councillor Jonathan Sri wants to see large parts of inner-city Brisbane banned from development.
The 10 flood planning areas covering rivers and creeks influence development approvals, with the worst flooding areas "subject to the highest development assessment requirements" and generally best used for recreation, according to the council's website.
Cr Sri said repurposing the land as public green space would address the need for more inner-city green space and prevent people living in apartment towers being cut off by floodwater.
"Even if your actual apartment is well above the flood level, if the power, sewerage and water pumps fail in your building, that’s not a healthy place to be trapped while you wait a few days for floodwaters to recede," Cr Sri said.
"Instead of replacing the flood-prone warehouses along Montague Road with more high rises, we should be acquiring and redeveloping those sites as public parkland."
Sections of inner-city Brisbane prone to serious flooding, according to the council's mapping, include around Mary Street and Albert Street.
Sections of inner-city suburbs such as Toowong and Milton are also mapped as flood-prone, along with Norman Creek in East Brisbane.
Cr Sri said the Greens wanted industrial sites in South Brisbane compulsorily acquired by the council and replaced with community green space to prevent future flood damage.
"Developers like to tell you that you can design around the problem, but the best way to design around flooding is to not build in the riverbed in the first place," he said.
"We’re better off using that land for community gardens, sports fields and vegetated native habitat areas."
From 2006 the Brisbane council began acquiring properties that had a 50 per cent chance of being flooded each year, and after the 2011 floods significantly tightened development restrictions in flood-prone areas.
Cr Sri said the Greens were not opposed to owner-occupier renovations and adaptive reuse of existing buildings but wanted future development in the flooding zones to halt.