Nort East Business Park,,,, one step closer

[Mrs Ronnie H]

Hi
Total agreement Paddles about the river-- But on the other side of things anything with the possibility of creating Jobs around here I am all for it.

I don't want anything to do with a Marina but as for business including factories, any retail prospects it has my vote. We need some input in this area and although as I said i am entirely against any Marina development anything that has the possibility of promoting growth and employment in this area has to be seen as something good.

Ronnie.

[PADDLES]

hi ronnie, i actually could live with a much smaller marina, maybe something the size of spinnaker or even smaller, but i do not support dredging to allow all tides entry for big boats. monty's has been there for years as a big boat yard and there are many other private big boat owners already in the river, these guys all get by without a dredged channel (even though they may possibly like a deeper channel) and they all currently have very minimal impact on the recreational users of the river, but 1000 more additional boats is just unacceptable. anyone who fishes or kayaks in the river would understand just how small our river is and what the effect of the additional boat traffic from such a large marina would be. the river would effectively just become a driveway/arterial route for all those boats wanting to go from the marina out into the bay. fishing or any other recreational activity like kayaking etc. would just become impossible/unsafe to do in the river because of all the wake and just the fear of being hit by another boat.

[Mrs Ronnie H]

Paddles
I am completely with you on that issue. Its bad enough now on certain days and an increase in boat traffic like that would certainly have a huge impact on the river. There are enough obstacles in the river to navigate now and could you imagine what it would be like trying to fish with boats constantly creating wash-- and we all know no one hardly keeps it down to 6knots. Lets face it our river would not sustain such an impact.

While you're here what do you think of the pontoon. Nice to see the state government putting in a fishing and crabbing platform for the land based fisho's. ???? We don't bother with it as its just to hard to weave your way through the fishing lines and crab pots tied off from it and then to walk along it you need to dodge the deck chairs and eskys. JMO-- I hate it and have rendered one ramp pretty useless.

Ronnie

[PADDLES]

Hi Ronnie, we actually love the pontoon but yeah, fully acknowledge the issues with how some people are using it. I haven't had any problems yet as i only use it with the big boat and not the tinny, but Tony over the road has witnessed some ridiculous stuff going on there with landbased fishos getting upset with boaties. I dropped an email to our then local state member Carryn Sullivan to thank her for the pontoon and to ask whether the original specifications for the pontoon included signage for landbased anglers to give way to boats as this either has been removed/stolen or not installed by the contractor. She chased it up and said that signage wasn't included in the contract but was warranted, however even though the infrastructure was a state funded project, the management of it is handed over to the council at project completion. I haven't had the chance to chase this up with Chris Whiting our local counciller yet, but given that you've now reminded me and that local elections are imminent it's probably a good time, i'll keep you posted on any response. I think as long as we all respect each other hopefully there'll be no agro but sometimes this isn't always the case.

[choppa]

hi ronnie, i actually could live with a much smaller marina, maybe something the size of spinnaker or even smaller, but i do not support dredging to allow all tides entry for big boats. monty's has been there for years as a big boat yard and there are many other private big boat owners already in the river, these guys all get by without a dredged channel (even though they may possibly like a deeper channel) and they all currently have very minimal impact on the recreational users of the river, but 1000 more additional boats is just unacceptable. anyone who fishes or kayaks in the river would understand just how small our river is and what the effect of the additional boat traffic from such a large marina would be. the river would effectively just become a driveway/arterial route for all those boats wanting to go from the marina out into the bay. fishing or any other recreational activity like kayaking etc. would just become impossible/unsafe to do in the river because of all the wake and just the fear of being hit by another boat.

I am receiving further info on this project over the next few days,,, but what I have at the moment is as follows

Respectfully, the Marina is the "HUB" of this project,, there has been no submission to down grade nor upsell its size at this present time and high doubts that either of these will occur.
To tag a bit of further info, the "dredging" of the Caboolture River is only expected to effect a maximum of 10 km's of waterway, this is certainly to deepen, BUT also to widen certain parts, and of course to assist in the Marina construction itself. There was a lot of info on this matter that went honestly in one ear and straight out the other, hence why I have taken the opportunity to get a hard copy which I'll download here once obtained

Monty's was thrown into the conversation, I have used his ramp and honesty box on numerous occassions also, so I was intro'ed if anything was aimed directly at his business,, nothing was received in feedback that was negative, albeit we are only in the initial stages of this project, if it does eventuate, what will occur in 10 years time is anyone's guess

Spinnaker Marina,,, IMO will suffer,,, let's be totally honest,, it's dying now and has been for some time. In the wet docks they have more "consignment boats for sale" than personal,, take into account the amount of pro boats there and then look at the dry dock storage area, (which hasn't been filled in years) and there's not much left to help pay the bills. The Chanderlary has downsized it shop twice that I'm aware of to assist in the high rental costs,, the workshop, to be fair, is normally busy, but is not swamped with work and of course staff will learn of bigger $$ or better conditions once the New Marina is established and its only a few k's down the road. The Seafood Restaurant (which is owned via Mrs Choppa's Aunt), is up for sale,,, not for any of the above reasons,, the owners are retiring. BUT think a bit here,, this Restaurant use to be a Tackle Shop/Takeaway,, went broke,, the Restaurant stepped in and even tho it's holding it's own,, it has no where near the traffic passing through its doors as per those on Bribie itself. Then we have the infamous boat ramps at Spinnaker,,, the main ramp is great,, is regulary maintained via council with washdowns and repair,, tables,, loo's,,,etc etc,,, BUT visit this ramp during Holiday season and it fails with lack of car parking,,, add an ABT Tournament for debate sake with tourists and its a F#&*( nightmare,,, (fun to watch tho!),,, its neighbour ramp is serviceable but in any high wind is a waste,,, and again it fails with car parking. It's not unusual to see cars/trailers parked along Bribie Road during holidays. Spinnaker Marina must be within the North Shore's gun sights,, and being a smaller concern I feel will become a second choice for those seeking berths, especially with the current major problem of Spinnaker revolving around SECURITY,,, there is none

once i get more info i'll post it here,,, but I have been doing a bit of research reading also via google,,, i can see that the companies behind this project have had a terrific run of success with past projects,,, I am yet to find any proposals put forward that have been failures,,,, I'll keep reading

choppa

[Mrs Ronnie H]

Hi Ronnie, we actually love the pontoon but yeah, fully acknowledge the issues with how some people are using it. I haven't had any problems yet as i only use it with the big boat and not the tinny, but Tony over the road has witnessed some ridiculous stuff going on there with landbased fishos getting upset with boaties. I dropped an email to our then local state member Carryn Sullivan to thank her for the pontoon and to ask whether the original specifications for the pontoon included signage for landbased anglers to give way to boats as this either has been removed/stolen or not installed by the contractor. She chased it up and said that signage wasn't included in the contract but was warranted, however even though the infrastructure was a state funded project, the management of it is handed over to the council at project completion. I haven't had the chance to chase this up with Chris Whiting our local counciller yet, but given that you've now reminded me and that local elections are imminent it's probably a good time, i'll keep you posted on any response. I think as long as we all respect each other hopefully there'll be no agro but sometimes this isn't always the case.

Paddles
I contacted council some months back now about the problems I have encountered and asked that signage be placed around the pontoon as has been done in other places. I am yet to receive a reply and have all but given up on it.

I will leave it to you and hopefully something will happen.

Ronnie

[PADDLES]

Hi choppa, i beleive the two main companies behind the development are Laing O'Rourke and Port Binnli, both very large and well respected construction companies. I think Port Binnli developed some marinas down the southern bay and Laing O'Rourke has an international pedigree in large construction projects. I've commented on this in other threads so sorry for repeating myself here.

I dunno how long you've followed the progress of this development choppa but in the beginning it was floated as a high end business park foremost with a marina and residential/golf community as (the way it seemed to a layman like myself) a secondary consideration. I'd suspect that this was possibly done to get it priority status with the state government as a significant development. And rightly so because we need more industry/development/jobs in Queensland and definitely in our shire. Then there seemed to be some issues with gaining council approval, not so much with the industrial development but mainly associated with the marina and dredging in the river. All of a sudden the marina became the only focus of the development and the developers claimed that without the marina the development may not be viable or go ahead. So I ask myself and anyone who cares to read this the question, was the marina ALWAYS the main focus of this project? or was our government of the day misled into giving this project significant status thinking it was a major industrial development when all along it was a development aimed at building one of the biggest marinas in the world?

We have just had a couple of years in the bay where we have seen major rezoning of areas within the moreton bay marine park to protect and conserve areas of significance within the marine park. According to DERM we have an area of significance right out the front of Beachmere and it has been declared a marine national park (green zone) by them. This project will initially dredge and presumably perform maintenance dredging activities into an area right next to this green zone. I am assuming that the seagrass meadow in this green zone doesn't get whipper snipped at the boundary and that there is actually seagrass in the areas surrounding the green zone too. Now if we have a read of the auditor general's departments report into this development well he reckons there's no areas of natural significance in any of the dredging work areas associated with this project. So who's right and who's wrong? We've got one government department wanting to protect the area for it's significant natural values and then another saying that there's nothing there and it's ok to cut it all up. What do you reckon? I'm suss myself.

It's very hard for someone who lives here and uses the river recreationally to explain how krap this full size marina will be for the current and future recreational users. Maybe the best way is to hook up your tinny, come for a drive and have a fish over the weekend and while you're sitting up amongst the mangroves pretending you're a million miles from anywhere, imagine what it would be like to have a couple 40 foot Rivieras pass each other in opposite directions right in front of you while you're quietly drowning a yabby. I just think of the small boat anglers, the kayakers, even the kids who now go down there and muck about in their little tinnys, it'll be like turning a small dirt track that you could safely let you kids play on, into a highway.

[choppa]

paddles,,, I understand your concerns,, but remember,,, I'm just the messenger here,,,

i have fished the Beachmere area quite a lot since being on Bribie for 20 odd years so I do really appreciate your love of the area,,, and to answer your query on how long I have followed this development is easy as it was first brought to my attention as a "proposal" in mid to late 2007ish,,,

the reports that I have seen recently match those of a few years back with regards to the Marina,,, it has always been forefront with "other" projects establishing themselves around it,,, there is still speculation with regards to the Golf Course as I pointed out in my prior post whether this is a money issue or development I truly do not know,,, but it hasn't been scrapped at this stage

To have a Marina of this size built,, must have extreme foresight for the investors/shareholders/owners of the company,,, I do not know of many people within the Northern Suburbs of Brisbane that actually have 40' Riviera's, so in response to one of your concerns being a "traffic" issue upon completion I think will not eventuate until sometime after it's completion. I can recall the argument raised when Pacific Harbour was proposed, and yes the boat population has increased within the Bribie environs,, but we don't really see the explosion upon the actual water that was first debated, even on weekends it still is much the same. Whether or not this is due to the above average properties being sold with pontoons or they all fish late at night ,, i don't know. When I look at other marina's around Brissie, I am of the same opinion,, I do concede that in certain places it will be opposite, but they are outnumbered

I am tho taking up your offer about visiting the area,,,this arvo in fact,,, but landbased,,, i have a couple of pots in the top end soaking trying my luck for a couple of muddies to take to a small M&G this weekend,,,, spot K,,,

When I get this report,,, if you like pm me your email address,,, i'll onforward it to you

choppa

[Mrs Ronnie H]

Ok
My two cents for what its worth

For starters comparisons with boat traffic in Bribie passage and Caboolture river is abit unfair. Caboolture river is a narrow body of water compared to the passage and even smaller boats create alot of wash so the increase of any boat traffic in the river is going to cause concern. It os hard enough now , even if you are going slow not to disrupt others on the water so Yes- just imagine a couple of Riv's out there-- you'd get rocked out of your tinnie.
If you have a good look at present even around the boat ramp it is getting harder to navigate your way through the maze of boats on moorings which is a problem yet to be rectified in any way. I can see this becoming an ongoing issue with increased ease of access and more boaties using this river. Fine to say that is what a Marina is for but will it get all the boats out of the river-- possibly go towards an increased number of illegal moorings and congestion if you ask me.

I am of the opinion that it would not hurt to address the issue of some deepening of the water at Bakers Flat and better access to the Private boat ramp in whiting street. Because of the stable boat population in the river at present it is impossible to access the private ramp safely IMO and is getting more difficult through the bakers flat area Especially if you are new to the river.

I think I would like to see some form of public discussion with local residents-- maybe I am too late but there are present issues that need to be addressed and future issues and concerns of residents need to be fully answered.

I consider myself a local -- been here for 20 years or so myself and got to be involved in lots of stuff in the town, met lots of people and have spent many days out in my tinnie by myself enjoying the river. I don't want that spoiled as i am sure alot of people will be behind me on that.

Ronnie

[PADDLES]

hi choppa, my apologies, don't for 1 minute think i'm having a go at you, i'm honestly not. you're drawing this development back to everyone's attention again as it had gone quiet for a bit and that's a good thing. i reckon the reason there's not many big boats on the northside is that it's extremely hard to find a berth for one unless you live in a canal estate, that's what makes this marina so attractive for so many people, marine infrstructure is very scarce up our way.

i guess my issue is that we bought our big (trailer) boat a couple of years back from down at gold coast city marina and test ran it down the coomera river (which is bigger than our river), i knew north harbour was in the pipeline and the whole time i was freaking out that our river could be turned from a mangrove creek into just a "main road" like the coomera river is now. i don't know the number of berths on the coomera river but i'm sure at 900 wet and 500 dry this one proposed for the caboolture river would have to be close to what's available in the coomera river at present. it's hard to compare the southern end of the passage with the caboolture river because once you get up past baker's flats it's just so narrow and there's simply no room for someone to fish and a couple of other big boats overtake each other at the same time. good luck with the muddies this arvie mate and i'll pm you an address to send that report to, i'd be very interested to have a read. again, thanks for the info, as you can tell i'm very interested in how this thing goes even though i know full well that there's nothing that any individual can do to stop the marina in it's current form we've just got to rely on local and state government to act appropriately for us all.

[choppa]

John & Ronnie aren't going to like this

I called into the BP on Bribie earlier,, (morning coffee fix) and met up with Sergeant Jim Gerrard,, (old mate/fisho buddy),, he advised me the following

NEBP is a definite start,, the plans and construction facilities that were originally submitted have not been changed,, (Golf Course/Club is still going ahead) , the final approval was given 3-4 weeks ago, and apparently a release on this being accepted will be announced soon

Part of the reason why nothing has been broadcast to date is because of the following, and I qoute Jim to the best of my memory:

NEBP is STAGE 1,, it is the larger of all Stages, and will take longer to complete

Stage 2,, which was also given the go ahead at the same time as NEBP,, is for a Housing Estate to be built in Caboolture South, to accomadate 60,000. The estate will be self reliant, and is being built to be 100% Green, it swill finalise the "link" from Caboolture to Narangba and work (apparently) has already commenced

Stage 3,,, (you wont believe this) Caloundra South Project,,, approved and sanctioned late last week,,, This project will be Housing/Residential,,, Industrial,,, Tourist industries,,,, IT WILL link,, Caloundra to Donnybrook to Toorbul,, via an arterial "highway" similar to that that connects Maroochydore to Noosa. The Residential side will house 30-45,000

Upon completion of all 3 Projects, an aerial photograph (which Jim has at Bribie Police Stn,,(I'm going down later to have a look,, I'll take my iPhone for pics)),, shows a massive input of change within all of our backyards,,

Jim went a bit further to state that he was part of a general meeting amongst "officers" from Bribie,,Caboolture,,Deception Bay,,and Redcliffe with the following info,,

Caboolture Police Station will become a memory, The plans to build a "Mega Station" that will envelope Redcliffe, D-Bay, and Caboolture are currently in final approval stage, Caboolture will remain the Court House "Hub",,, (a new Court is being built now), The Bribie Police Station will lose its CIB Traing facility (recently placed there) and this will be enlarged within the new Mega Station,,,, overall time to complete above is "rumoured" at 2028

I have no "hard copy as of yet" that has been promised but I am on my way over to Caboolture shortly for my weekly "Bunnings" fix,,, I am planning to call into the CBEC and chase my old buddy up on this,,,, I have Googled the above info and come up with diddly squat,,, perhaps with more ammunition now ,,, CBEC may be able to shed more light and I'll call in to see Jim before reaching home to try and smuggle a pic of the aerial shot out of him.

as a footnote,,, when I worked in Currimundi 3-4 yerars back,,, there was "talk" of the Bruce Highway "upgrade" that focused around an arm to run south,,, at the time there was a lot of confusion about this and the general consensus was this work related to the Caloundra exit only,,, which has never changed since,, BUT,, if you have been to the Caloundra/Little Mountain Waste Disposal (Tip),,, that sits behind the Racecourse area,,, the amount of machinery that is sitting in the various yards there, and have been idle for this time to date,, makes me think,,,,

choppa,,, the messenger only,,,,lol

[PADDLES]

thanx choppa, got your message, i'll have a further look at this when i get home. there's been talk of getting rid of caboolture and caloundra airstrips and creating a big airstrip somewhere else for a number of years to allow more housing, maybe this is all go now.

[choppa]

just called into B/Island Police Stn,,,, to be advised that Jim is stationed at Caboolture and has been for some time,,,, WTF,,, I drove past there twice ,,

CBEC struck out as GMc is in Redcliffe,,, but it wasn't a waste of a trip knowledge wise and Greg (Pinhead) may be into'ed here,,,, the land at the start of the Bribie Bridge that has recently been fenced off and is now being cleared,,,, that's Bribie Islands new "NIGHT CLUB",,, it was to be built on the Island,,, but failed due to the amount of clubs/gaming machines/etc etc etc,,,, so they bought at Spinnaker,,, on what I was led to believe Heritage Listed Land????????????,,,,,,

choppa

[Mrs Ronnie H]

So what are we to be known as -- "THE GREATER SUNSHINE COAST".

Be interesting to see those Aerial pic's. Looks like everything good between Beachmere and Caloundra is going to be a forgotten memory. Just what we need- more ugly housing estates, less forests and will there be any breathe of land left untouched.

I'm trying to see a positive but if its like what they are doing before the bridge on Bribie then its getting harder to find one.

Like I said I am all for development and growth and the prospect of changing the employment situation is a good thing but at what cost to all of what we know this area for.

Choppa-- do you know what if any public consultation has been had. It is so long ago since this first came up.

This also jogs my memory to talk of a bridge over the Caboolture river to link DBAY and Bribie-- supposedly to happen up near monty's marina. ?????????

Ronnie

[choppa]

Choppa-- do you know what if any public consultation has been had. It is so long ago since this first came up.

yep there sure was,,,depending on what stage,,, 2006 i am lead to believe was the last one,,, (could be wrong,, as this effects more of Caloundra)