Which Brisbane plans are funded, and which are still drawings

Between 22 and 23 October 2026 The Courier-Mail's Future Brisbane series published three pieces about the city you will own property in by 2032: the first overhaul of South Bank in forty years, a four-kilometre cultural spine from the Gabba to Suncorp Stadium, and five architecture firms' visions for the riverfront. They arrived in the same week, in the same typeface, under the same banner — which makes it very easy to read all of them as things that are going to happen.

They are not the same kind of thing at all. One has a government process with dates attached. One is a developer's masterplan with a development application already lodged. One is a newspaper asking architects what they would do if nobody said no. Below, each is separated out, with who is committed to what — because the difference is the whole story if you are buying near the river.

消息来源 · Future Brisbane

South Bank: a real process, with real dates

This is the firmest of the three. The Queensland government has put a 4.8-hectare slice of South Bank — the piazza, the lagoons, the riverside green precinct, the main building fronting Streets Beach that houses South Beach and the Southbank Beer Garden, and Riverside Terrace — to the market for redevelopment.

Expressions of interest open

24 October 2026the Friday after the announcement

Final proponent chosen

end of 2027leaves four years to build

Site put to market

4.8 hapiazza, lagoons, riverside green precinct

Visitors a year

16 million+Deputy Premier's figure

Main lagoon leak

112,000 L a dayat its mid-2024 peak; it still leaks

Deputy Premier and Planning Minister Jarrod Bleijie said a new lagoon and upgraded open space are non-negotiable, and that the lagoon stays free. The leak is the part worth noticing: the main lagoon was losing 112,000 litres a day at its mid-2024 peak and still closes for repairs several times a year, so whoever wins the site inherits a repair job as well as a development opportunity.

What is *not* settled: who builds it, what it looks like, or what goes on the commercial part of the site. A developer has not been chosen. Nothing here is a design.

规划 · Kurilpa

The green spine is a proposal; the Stockwell masterplan underneath it is not

Town planners Urbis floated a four-kilometre cultural spine running from a redeveloped Gabba and Brisbane Arena through South Bank to Suncorp Stadium, over about a decade, including a new pedestrian bridge from West End to Milton. Urbis managing partner James Tuma framed it around Expo 88 — the legacy of which, he points out, was lifting the ban on outdoor seating.

That spine is an idea put forward by a consulting firm. It has no budget and no approval. But a large piece of the ground it crosses is already moving, and that part is real:

1. Stockwell, Kurilpa Peninsula

   Former Olympic medallists Mark and Tracy Stockwell bought the Parmalat dairy factory in South Brisbane and are anchoring a masterplan across several sites they own in South Brisbane and West End. A 30-storey residential tower on the former Pauls Milk site at Montague Road and Boundary Street has a development application lodged with Economic Development Queensland. Construction is to begin early in 2027, subject to approvals.

2. Lendlease, the Visy site

   Lendlease was named preferred Master Development Partner for the 7.1-hectare former Visy glass factory site in June 2026, for a residential redevelopment of the whole site plus riverfront parkland, promenades, plazas and pedestrian and cycling connections.

3. The hospitality pieces

   Stockwell proposes a "Beer Mile" on land under the rail overpass between Hope and Merrivale streets, and Aria Property Group has proposed "The Low Line" under the overpass through Fish Lane to South Brisbane station. Stockwell also wants Boundary Street renamed "Boundless Street" and the village called Kurilpa.

One number to treat carefully. The Courier-Mail describes the Stockwell project as a "12-stage masterplanned development" to be built over 15 to 20 years, with an ambition for a third of it finished by 2032. Other reporting on the same project describes about a dozen residential towers and a three-phase delivery. A tower count and a stage count are not the same claim, and we have not seen the staging plan, so treat the number of stages as unconfirmed and the fifteen-to-twenty-year horizon as the solid part.

设想 · 五家建筑事务所

The five visions are drawings, and the paper says so

Future Brisbane editor Rachel Riley asked five firms what they would do with the riverfront. The answers are good and worth reading. None of them is funded, approved or proposed by anyone who can build it.

• COX Architecture — a five-kilometre "River City Circuit" joining South Bank, the Goodwill Bridge, the Kangaroo Point Cliffs and the City Botanic Gardens into one walk, with a new museum beside the historic dry dock. COX partner Richard Coulson designed the Goodwill Bridge 25 years ago.
• Populous — "The Sine Vessel", a floating, rotating spectator platform for sailing and for events like Riverfire, with a 360-degree concourse and nets used as viewing hammocks.
• Hassell Studio — a new cruise terminal and arrival precinct at or near the existing Pinkenba terminal, aimed at the Games accommodation shortfall, modelled on its Doha Grand Terminal.

Read them as what the profession would like, not as a pipeline.

已定 · 场馆

The venue that is actually under way

Behind all three stories sits the one piece of 2032 infrastructure that has moved past drawings. The Victoria Park stadium — 63,000 seats, designed by a consortium led by Cox, Hassell and Azusa Sekkei — had its design revealed in January 2026 and its location confirmed near Gilchrist Avenue in March 2026. Published cost estimates range from about $3.6 billion to $3.8 billion, within a Games infrastructure program reported at about $7.1 billion. A draft legacy plan went to community consultation in August 2026.

It is also the most contested. The site draws organised opposition and ongoing legal challenges, and the current state government went to the 2024 election promising not to build a new stadium for the Games. A buyer should hold both facts at once: it is the most advanced venue project, and it is the one most likely to generate further argument.

对买家 · 南布里斯班与西区

What this changes for someone buying near the river

Almost all of the activity above lands in a narrow band: South Bank, South Brisbane, West End, Kurilpa Peninsula, Woolloongabba. If you are looking at an apartment in that band, the honest reading is this.

The committed items — the South Bank site going to market, the Visy site partner appointed, a 30-storey tower with a lodged application — are concentrated within walking distance of each other. That is a genuine change in the amount of construction, parkland and hospitality floor space heading for a small area over the next decade. It is also a genuine change in the amount of new apartment supply: the Visy site alone is a seven-hectare residential redevelopment, which is a supply story as much as an amenity story.

The uncommitted items — the spine, the bridge to Milton, the circuit, the floating vessel — should carry no weight in what you pay today. If an agent prices a view or a walk on the strength of a newspaper illustration, that is the agent's optimism, not a plan.

判断 · 谁该在意

Who should care, and who can ignore all of it

Care if you are buying to hold in South Brisbane, West End or Woolloongabba. The amenity around these addresses will be visibly different by 2032, and the construction will be visible sooner than that. Both the upside and the disruption are concentrated here, and the supply arriving on the Visy and Parmalat sites is close enough to matter to resale.

You can ignore most of it if you are buying in Ipswich, Logan, Moreton Bay or on the Gold Coast. A cultural spine between the Gabba and Suncorp does not change a house-and-land package in South Ripley. The one item with genuine reach beyond the inner city is the Victoria Park stadium and its transport, and even that is a long way from being a reason to choose a suburb.

常见问题 · Future Brisbane

The four questions buyers ask

If you are looking at something specific in South Brisbane or West End and want to know which of these actually sits near it, send me the address and I will mark it against the committed items rather than the drawings.

Sources: The Courier-Mail, Future Brisbane series — "Urbis floats 10-year plan for 4km Gabba to Suncorp Stadium green spine" (22 October 2026), "Future Brisbane: South Bank to undergo greatest revamp in 40 years" (23 October 2026) and "Brisbane's bold 2032 Olympic legacy designs revealed" (23 October 2026), all filed in our market-research folder on 26 October 2026. Victoria Park stadium details, the Lendlease appointment and the Stockwell staging comparison are from separate published reporting, cross-checked on 26 October 2026 and noted where they disagree with the Courier-Mail account. Nothing on this page is advice on any individual property, and no figure here is a forecast by FX Home.