Stakeholders behind one of Brisbane’s biggest tourist drawcards, South Bank, have not included an Indigenous culture centre on the draft master plan released for public consultation.
State governments since that of former Labor premier Peter Beattie have talked up the need for such a centre and even discussed a site at South Bank or the adjacent cultural precinct.
Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner in 2020 offered $1 million to help kick off the project, and various tourism strategies have listed it as a priority.
While the draft master plan makes various references to First Nations culture and a Gondwanaland treetop walk, it does not set aside land for a centre.
Under the plan, the piazza may be replaced with more open-air venues; a seafood restaurant and market could be added to the Maritime Museum; and new restaurants and cafes might pop up along the Brisbane River near the Cultural Forecourt – even if they have to be “resiliently designed” to cope with future floods.
At this stage, the parklands will not stretch around Kurilpa Point – as proposed by former deputy premier Jackie Trad in 2017 – but remain between the Maritime Museum and Victoria Bridge.
Deputy Premier Steven Miles confirmed an Indigenous centre was still on the agenda, but not yet on the drawing board.
Read the article by Tony Moore in the Brisbane Times.