A Tamborine Mountain resident has created a petition calling on the state government to put in place laws to limit population growth on the mountain.
Pamela Brandis said the mountain cannot sustain further development and hoped a cap on the number of residents would in turn limit development.
“I have been here since 1988 picking dead wildlife off the road. It’s getting worse and worse: the traffic and building and fighting about development,” she explained.
Pamela said there are many reasons why the mountain warrants protection and capping of population, including its surrounding UNESCO listed Gondwana rainforest, lack of reticulated water and the impact to the environment when heavy rain causes septic tanks to overflow.
“The wildlife and rainforest are the main reasons I live here. I’ve spent a lot of time walking in the rainforest seeing lyrebird’s feathers and platypus, but now you don’t see them and the traffic is terrible,” Pamela said.
“There aren’t enough doctors here and in times of drought it’s a six week wait for water.”
She said the proposed Living Gems over 50s development in Kidd Street was a major concern, which would increase the number of residents significantly.
The most current data from the 2021 census puts the population at just over 8,000 people living in 3,463 private dwellings.
Under the state government’s Shaping SEQ 2023 plan Tamborine Mountain is designated part of the regional landscape and rural living, which means it’s not intended for urban living.
Tamborine Mountain is sited as an area to protect and nurture the regional biodiversity network and manage regional landscapes.
The plan rules out any push for rezoning large areas for standard suburban residential lots.
Based on current zoning and land availability the plan predicts a population of 12,000 people by 2046.
Member for Scenic Rim Jon Krause said the state government will be reviewing the SEQ Regional Plan in this term of government.
“I would encourage local residents who hold concerns about development issues to make a submission to that review when it takes place,” he said.
“Similarly, when the council next reviews its planning scheme that is the time when all locals have the chance to make submissions about how they wish to see future development take place in the Scenic Rim.”
He said council’s planning scheme was the primary mechanism for setting out what type of development can take place in local areas.
Division One Councillor, Amanda Hay, said there had been previous attempts to cap the mountain’s population given its reliance on rainwater, domestic bores and lack of any sewerage system.
“It was believed that the (council’s) Planning Scheme would naturally limit population growth based on the minimal number of properties which can be sub-divided, however this did not take into account the proliferation of second dwellings, dual occupancies, granny flats, cabins, and tiny homes which have the potential to significantly increase population numbers,” she said.
“Fortunately, the state government is not expecting the mountain to share the burden of providing more than a few new dwelling sites, unlike Beaudesert and other townships in the region.
“However, in the event that the two current lifestyle village applications are approved, this would see an increase of 200 new dwellings, without the creation of any new lots. This would be an unprecedented increase in both dwellings and residents on our constrained Mountain.”
Dr Laurel Johnson a Senior Research Fellow in University of Queensland’s Institute for Social Science Research with expertise in development said there are no population caps in Queensland.
“Noosa tried a cap and failed. The council supported it, but the state government said no,” she said.
“There needs to be an appetite politically for a population cap.”
She said it becomes a problem when the distribution of population is not evenly shared across the state creating an equity issue.
Dr Johnson also warned that population caps drove house prices up, making areas unaffordable for workers to live in.
“In an affordability housing crisis like now that would be political suicide,” she said.
“The best method to cap population is to stop the supply of new residential buildings and the council has to administer this.”
Pamela believes any increase in population would be too much for the mountain and its wildlife to manage and said she won’t stop until proper protections are in place.
“I’ll harass them (the state government) until they do something,” she stated.
She hopes to reach 1000 signatures and said the online support has been extremely strong.
“We need to keep it for tourism and future generations,” Pamela said.
The petition is available at https://www.parliament.qld.gov.au/Work-of-the-Assembly/Petitions/Petition-Details?id=4322 or Google QLD state e-petitions number 4322.
