Gold Coast council's Springbrook cableway edges forward but with slashed funding

Progress has been made in the effort to build a major tourism attraction in the World Heritage-listed Gold Coast hinterland, but with a fraction of the funding.

A report to Gold Coast council called for $1.5 million to develop a business case for a tourist cableway in Springbrook.

But on Tuesday, councillors voted to redirect $400,000 previously set aside for an unsuccessful First Nations consultation process to environmental assessments instead of the full business case.

Councillors also voted to add a second potential route at Tamborine — beyond Springbrook's Gondwana rainforests — to the assessment process.

Mayor Tom Tate, who supported the proposal, said he expected the environmental assessment to be completed by April next year.

"The report will come back pretty quickly because now it includes Mount Tamborine — they'll run out of money and want to update us to get more funding," he said.

The vote marks the latest chapter in a long-running effort to develop a cableway, almost three decades after it was first rejected.

A long, complicated history

The Beattie government rejected a cableway proposal in 2000 for failing to meet environmental protection requirements.

In 2014, LNP MP and former Gold Coast mayor Ray Stevens invested in and consulted on a $100-million cableway plan, but it never progressed.

The City of Gold Coast conducted a $150,000 pre-feasibility study in 2020 that stated the cableway could attract 580,000 visitors and generate $35 million per year.

But it did not identify a specific route the cableway would take.

In 2022, the former Labor state government told council that it must undertake consultation with traditional owners and gain their consent before the project could move forward.

But council's consultation process stalled.

The registered native title claimant, Danggan Balun, did not support the project and requested more information about the route.

Another previous native title representative, Jabree, declined to participate in the consultation but offered support.

The LNP government has backed the cableway after its 2024 election but has declined the council's request for funding.

"[That would] potentially compromise the state's ability to approve a proposal, noting that there could be a conflict of interest if the state were both working on the proposal and approving it," a report tabled to council this month said.

Lengthy wait for outcome

Cr Tate said he expected a "definitive answer" on what route the cableway would take by the end of 2026.

Council could then vote to fund a business case which would take another two years.

The proposal would then need to pass a complicated state and federal approval process before then being ratified by the World Heritage Committee.

At Tuesday's council meeting, councillor Donna Gates said council needed "to once and for all say if we're in or out".

But Lois Levy, a campaigner with conservation group Gecko, said "one wonders what [council] has been doing for the past 12 months".

"They seem to think it's OK to exploit our national parks and our World Heritage Area without recognising how important these areas are," she said.

"We've got issues of climate change putting additional pressure, it's got pressure of feral animals, weeds, too many visitors already.

"They need to say, 'No, we're not going to spend any more money, waste any more time on a project that will never get up.'"

After the environmental assessments are conducted, the council has resolved that no further work be done progressing the cableway until broad community and First Nations support is confirmed.

Council CEO Tim Baker told Tuesday's meeting that four Australian developers have expressed interest in the Springbrook cableway but did not identify who they were.