RESIDENTS are no longer getting what’s on the label when it comes to the promise of regional living.
Rosewood, Walloon and Amberley once enticed families with their country feel while knowing Ipswich city was a short drive away.
But times have changed and the city has crept closer.
Rosewood resident David Pahlke served as the local councillor from 1991 to 2018.
“Going back to when I was a councillor, it was never my plan to have a rural area full of small blocks,” he said.
“The last time that went to council I voted against it.
“I know what’s happening now … kids just don’t play in the backyard like they used to.
“The cost of a block of land 600 by 500 square metres for example, has gone up so much that people can no longer afford it.
“I remember [council] approving 10, 250-square-metre blocks side by side and I couldn’t stop it.
“I did ask for extra car parking out on the road because I knew what was going to happen.” He said the result of multiple block development was seen in residential streets where cars lined either side of the road.
“State Government controls the number of blocks, not council,” he said.
“In the South East Queensland Plan it says you can only have so many blocks per hectare,” he said.
“And when you put it all down it can even go to 400, 500 and in some cases 300 square metres, and it’s not council doing this, it’s the State Government.
“People don’t move to regional places to see wall to wall housing.”
He said the last time the South East Queensland Plan was before council eight years ago, he voted against it.
“I didn’t agree with it, but I was only one councillor,” he said.
“And now with the housing crisis it needs to be revisited.
“This is a rural area and it’s rural living, not suburban living.”
Driving through Rosewood, the country feel is still there but the city is lapping at the edges.
“The infrastructure hasn’t kept up, like the roads in Amberley even,” he said.
The regions are bursting as families are pushed out of the housing market and look for cheaper places to live.
“And you always know when it is school pick up because of all the traffic in the main streets,” he said.
“Work needs to be done now rather than in 10 year’s time or we’ll end up like the Gold Coast with its motorways where its’ bumper to bumper traffic even outside of peak hours.”
