LAST month’s announcement that the federal government would demand a say in planning the future of Australian cities saw Queensland premier Anna Bligh immediately jump in with a suggestion. Ms Bligh applauded prime minister Kevin Rudd’s approach but said her state already had the answers. Lauding her government’s infrastructure plan as an international award winner, Ms Bligh said it could be the model to guide the growth of the “big Australia” Mr Rudd envisaged. There is fat chance of that now. Central to that SEQ infrastructure plan was her government’s $9 billion water strategy which now lies exposed as an exercise in pure folly.

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FIVE million cubic metres of earth are being shifted to to make way for stage one of the Bruce Highway deviation, north of Cooroy. But the state government claims the big move was not made necessary by planning for the Traveston Crossing Dam. However, as heavy earthmoving equipment continues to dramatically alter once familiar geographic features, that claim has been disputed by residents, politicians and the government’s own documents. Behind Federal State School, a huge hill consisting of one million cubic metres of earth is being reshaped to take a route which would have skirted the dam’s eastern buffer if it had gone ahead. Work on the $613 million, 12km section from Sankeys Road to Traveston Road started in earnest only six weeks before federal environment minister Peter Garrett ruled the dam could not be built.

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Updated on Saturday, November 14, 2009 at 08:28AM by stevem

The Beattie announcement in 2006 was a call to arms that united people who previously had not known each other and unleashed a powerful defence that was ultimately to prevail. None of the key group held enormous hope that Garrett would decide against the dam. Remarkably, they all believed that a “yes” from the federal minister, rather than being the death knell of their campaign, would simply provide focus to what they saw as an inevitable court challenge. By that stage campaigners had endured two elections and weekly twists and turns that had lifted and dampened spirits. They are now battle hardened, have a clear vision for the sustainable future they want for their community and will be ready to fight hard if, after pulling apart the economy and social fabric of the valley, the state government just walks away.

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Updated on Friday, November 13, 2009 at 08:02AM by stevem

Updated on Friday, November 13, 2009 at 08:20AM by stevem

THE Sunshine Coast environmental scientist whose technology is about to revolutionise the way water can be delivered to the region said yesterday that there was no role for desalination. Justin Holbrook has received a $4.8 million federal climate change adaptation grant to help fund a pilot rainwater harvesting and reuse project that will make the new Coolum Ridges development 90% water self-sufficient.

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One of the laziest arguments put forward by proponents of a bigger Australia is the need to feed more taxpayers into the system to fund the looming mass retirement of baby boomers. The theory goes that if we don’t grow by the 60% the prime minister projects, to a national population of 35 million in the next 40 years, either the existing workforce would have to pay more tax or baby boomers would experience a meaner retirement. Property council darling Bernard Salt and certain state government demographers say the cost can be met simply by increasing the tax base through growth and young migrants, who they presume won’t get sick or require a pension for at least 40 years. Also forgotten is the cost of educating their children. The laziness of this argument is both apparent and dangerous.

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IT’S a battle that for a long time looked like being carried alone by the Sunshine Coast. Capacity, its true meaning and measure, is a concept with which many understandably struggle. Only 35 years ago, when there was plenty of everything here other than population, opportunity and profit, many were blinkered to the long-term costs of failing to properly plan for growth. How different and more liveable would the high-density Alexandra Headland strip have been if the council of the day had found the meagre $1 million needed in the late 1980s to secure for parkland the mainly vacant land that stretched from Tantula Road down to Alexandra Parade. How much smarter to have left that coast road as a link to foreshore parks and parking rather than turning it into the drag strip it is today.

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THE use of wasted heat from Swanbank power station to distil sea water in huge quantities was an option the state government failed to examine before deciding on the Traveston Crossing Dam. Former army intelligence captain Graham Bates, who now lives in Maroochydore, has written to federal environment minister Peter Garrett, mayor Bob Abbot and infrastructure minister Stirling Hinchliffe urging the option be given serious consideration. In a 37 page document, “Traveston Crossing Dam, solution or white elephant” he argues that cogeneration to produce pure water for storage in Wivenhoe dam was a more sustainable and viable option than a dam he says may never fill. Mr Bates said yesterday that the technology was proven and in use in both Dubai and Saudi Arabia.

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Updated on Wednesday, October 21, 2009 at 11:22AM by stevem

THE federal court case which sought to test whether a Queensland government corporation had abided by conditions relating to the construction of Paradise Dam will resume next month after environment minister Peter Garrett decided not to intervene. The case, brought by Wide Bay Burnett Conservation Council, was adjourned last month after the government corporation, Burnett Water, petitioned Mr Garrett to change a condition which required that lungfish be able to move up and downstream of the dam wall. Conservation council spokesman Roger Currie said the decision had ramifications for the proposed Traveston Crossing Dam.

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AN ecologist with worldwide experience in freshwater species said the assessment of Traveston Crossing Dam by the coordinator general had been fundamentally flawed. Dr Lyndon DeVantier said he had written to coordinator general Colin Jensen urging that a general population viability analysis be conducted to assess the likelihood of species extinction as a consequence of the dam’s construction. He said the modelling was the best that had been produced by the global ecology community but was not carried out. “Why wasn’t the modelling done?” Dr DeVantier asked. “We’ve been left with ‘trust us’.”

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Updated on Tuesday, October 13, 2009 at 07:18AM by stevem

Updated on Tuesday, October 13, 2009 at 03:11PM by stevem

Updated on Wednesday, October 14, 2009 at 09:02AM by stevem

Updated on Wednesday, October 14, 2009 at 11:48AM by stevem

Updated on Wednesday, October 14, 2009 at 01:44PM by stevem

Updated on Friday, October 16, 2009 at 10:02AM by stevem

COORDINATOR general Colin Jensen has rejected claims by environmentalists that the independence of his assessment of the $1.8 billion Traveston Crossing Dam proposal was compromised. Environmentalists argue that as both coordinator general and director general of the department of infrastructure charged - according to the government’s own website - with responsibility “for overseeing the delivery of the largest infrastructure program in Queensland’s history’’ that he effectively approved his own work. Questions have also been raised about scientific endorsement of the project by academics from the University of Queensland because of the $45 million worth of benefit it would gain as a direct result of the dam’s approval.

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