Hopefully the below explains why CQ needs a game breaker. Because just
going along thinking if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it isn’t going to work
out forour kids. Planning to benefit them should be happening NOW.
CQ’s Game Changer – The Justification
Why does Central Queensland need a game changer? Last week my aspiration
was for planning to start now to develop a game changer for Central
Queensland. I suggested the combined Councils of Central Queensland
would be instrumental in developing such a plan and that a bullet train
from the coast to Uluru travelling roughly along the 23.5° latitude
could be the game changer needed. Now I’ve been challenged, why does CQ
need a game changer? A little like ‘if it ain’t broke why fix it’.
Change has made it ‘if it ain’t broke, break it’. This resource boom
will end. What happens to CQ then? Arguably CQ relies too much on the
resource sector to generate wealth. In the short term this reliance will
only grow. Growth that could be to the detriment of other industries,
farming being one of them. The resource companies won’t re-invest
profits made out of this region into this region after the boom ends.
State and Federal Governments may think likewise. Unless other viable,
major opportunities presents themselves. Game changer opportunities.
Ones that create jobs and on-going employment.
Ones that enable mining town’s on-going sustainability.
Ones that truly help decentralise Queensland.
Ones that positions Central Queensland as a go ahead region.
Ones that retains the labour and families that have moved to CQ because of the resource boom.
Ones that due to their daring and innovation gain both international attention and visitation.
Ones that become a catalyst for greater population growth and greater political representation that comes from it.
Ones that our kids can benefit from.
As my greatest concerns with this resource boom; along with the damage
to our agricultural land, possible water contamination, the social costs
of a fly in fly out work force; are what benefits this resource boom
will provide for our kids. When the workforce is gone, their temporary
quarters disassembled, mines abandoned, what will our kids have to show
for all the resources that have left out shores?
Long term benefits and not just short term fixes are needed to be voiced
and pursued. In my opinion a game changer project will need to include
an international airport for Central Queensland. If we want (or more
correctly need) international tourists to utilise a bullet train service
we need to make it easy for them, a direct service. My suggestion of
Central Queensland International Airport at Raglan is at best thought as
pie in the sky, but with Rockhampton Airport flood prone, the growing
city of Gladstone needing more land, is the suggestion that ridiculous?
Especially if a bullet train service was operating between the two
cities. We’ve got to think beyond small and beyond Council borders.
Central Queensland is a dynamic, vibrant region, arguably the greatest
place in the world to live – currently the engine room of Australia.
We’ve got to plan how to keep it that way, after all our future is not
to see, it is to create. Community pressure is an important factor in
creating a future we aspire to.