Following the horrific death of a cyclist in 2014 at the corner of Stanley Street and Annerley Road, the Brisbane City Council has proposed a plan to close an on-ramp that leads to the Pacific Motorway to accommodate a new bikeway. However, not everyone agrees with the council’s proposal.
The plan is to close the slip lane to the southbound on-ramp to the motorway along Stanley St and this also involves the removal of over 70 on-street car park spaces as part of its design for the Woolloongabba Bikeway.
However, Transport and Main Roads (TMR) Minister Mark Bailey along with Deputy Premier Jackie Trad have rejected the proposal. Nonetheless, TMR is willing to work with the council to come up with a solution that both parties can agree on.
Local businesses are also speaking up despite agreeing with the council’s plan having found out that their establishments will be affected leaving them with no space for vehicles to safely stop by.
The Lady Cilento Children’s and Mater Hospitals are also complaining about the loss of car park spaces for the staff and the patients to make way for the Woolloongabba Bikeway.
Despite the complaints, it looks like the council remains firm on their plan. Their aim is to provide safe cycling options to the city and since the motorway slip road is managed by the State Government, their approval is the most significant. Also, after considering several options, the council finds that removal of the left-turn slip lane will provide the safest route for cyclists by minimising potential conflict points between cyclists, motorists, and pedestrians.
The project is part of the council’s Better Bikeways for Brisbane program with a $100 million investment. It aims to extend along Stanley St, between Ipswich Rd in Woolloongabba, and Dock St in South Brisbane and along Annerley Rd between Stanley St, Woolloongabba, and Gladstone Rd in Dutton Park.
The bikeway project will start in late 2018 and will be completed by mid-2019.
Daniel Brook enlivens Annerley’s View Street as his Ice-cream dreams (2018) artwork gets chosen as one of the winners of the Council’s Brisbane Canvas project.
Daniel Brook’s Ice-cream dreams (2018) can be seen on View Street, Annerley. Photo credit: Brisbane City Council
Brisbane Canvas 2018 presents a rich range of contemporary and creative commissioned street art on several walls, pillars, and bridges at different sites across Brisbane.
Brisbane Canvas celebrates the city’s creative scene with commissioned street arts that embodies this year’s theme which is “Optimism”. During the expression of interest phase in December 2017, artists were asked to choose one of 14 potential sites and submit a concept design that reflects the theme.
David Houghton’s “Froglife” (2018) can be seen on Bridgeman Road, Bridgeman Downs near the intersection of Beams and Bridgeman roads. Photo credit: Brisbane City Council
From more than 180 art submissions, eight successful artists were chosen on January 2018 to display their artworks at the streets of Brisbane.
Brisbane Canvas Winners
The Canvas artworks can be seen scattered across eight streets across Brisbane. Here is a list of other talented artists that were selected and the location of their murals:
Sophie Mary Mac’s “You’re an Incredible Combination of Things” at Windsor Road, Red Hill
David Sargent’s “Lost & Found” at Macquarie Street, Teneriffe
Deb Mostert’s “Free Form Birds” at Moggill Road, Pinjarra Hills
Kirsten Baade’s “Pods” at Cornwall Street, Greenslopes
David Houghton “Froglife” at Bridgeman Road, Bridgeman Downs
James Alley’s untitled art at Hoyland Street, Bald Hills
The winners of the Brisbane Canvas 2018 have installed their artwork at their chosen site in June 2018. You can view all of the pieces on the Brisbane City Council’s Brisbane Canvas Outdoor Galleries Flickr album.
Thinking of what to do with your kids during the winter holidays? Why not take them to a historic trip down at Dutton Park?
Boggo Road Gaol is offering special school holiday rates that you might want to grab every day starting 30 June until 7 July. The tour will start at 11:00 a.m. and last for over an hour. A tour guide who will take you through the Number 2 Division, around the gatehouse, yards, and the Circle. The tour will end at the F Wing cell block.
During this school holiday tour offer, you can get adult tickets at a concession price and a special family rate this July:
Adult – $24
Adult Concession: $20
Teens (12-17) – $17.50
Children (5-11) – $12.50
Children (under 5) – FREE
Family (2 adults & 2 children) – $55
Single family (1 adult + up to 3 children) – $50
The Boggo Road Gaol is known to be Queensland’s most notorious prison and is one of the most intriguing tourist attractions in Brisbane. It was built in 1883 and was closed in 1992.
Number Two Division
The Number Two Division is the only remaining section of the Gaol. It used to keep female inmates in 1903, but in 1921, the women were moved to make way for male prisoners from St Helena Island. It was also home to the state’s infamous inmates such as Arthur ‘Slim’ Halliday and Jane Finch.
The tour will let you in on the secrets within the brick walls and even beyond that. Get to hear about escapes, the inmates, and many more.
Paper Moon Cafe in Annerley is a blast from the past – with retro interior and laid-back atmosphere, the cafe adds a touch of eccentricity to the suburb’s cafe scene.
Owned by mother and daughter Holly Whitefield and Jodi Craig, the cafe was intended to give the suburb a cool and relaxing space where locals can peacefully sip their coffee whilst soft jazz music plays in the background.
The cafe boasts of exposed brick walls and art deco posters that give the place that retro vibe. If you’re up for a game of pool with your buds, there’s a pool table available on-site as well as board games and a jukebox. There are retro booths, comfortable couches where you can talk whilst there are also arcade game tables outside the cafe.
At night, the cafe transforms into a function space wherein musicians and other artists are invited to play their music.
Photo credit: Paper Moon Cafe / Facebook
They offer Bear Bones coffee along with a selection of teas and smoothies. The cafe only has a small menu that offers baked treats such as caramel slices, chicken wraps, and organic steak pies to name a few.
Photo credit: Paper Moon Cafe / Facebook
Should you want to get some booze in your system you can BYO your own beer or your choice of liquor. Corkage fees apply. You can also bring your own food. Food trucks also come around from time to time to serve a variety of food to the cafe-goers.
Aside from live entertainment at night, you can also book the venue if you have any functions of your own.
If you want to know who’s performing as well as the food truck that is dropping by, check out their Facebook pagefor regular updates.
The Yeronga Community Garden has been an active supporter of the Brisbane City Council’s composting projects. They have been hosting various workshops to promote this cause.
For this particular workshop, attendees will be taught how to use recycled timber and compost from the Community Compost Hub to make a no-dig garden.
Photo credit: CC-BY/Mike McCune/Flickr
No-dig gardening is an efficient way to create productive food gardens at home. This technique is popular for reusing materials such as crushed concrete, bricks, pavers, woodchip, and sawdust to make paths and garden edges.
The workshop will also be teaching participants the skills needed to make their own raised garden bed at home using the no-dig gardening technique.
All You Can Eat Gardens’ No-dig Garden Bed Photo credit: www.allyoucaneatgardens.com.au
This free event is facilitated by Tim Davies from All You Can Eat Gardens, a landscape design and gardening service that aims to develop an abundant, diverse, and easy to maintain food garden at home.
Workshop attendees are asked to wear a hat, a long sleeve shirt, and closed shoes.
Booking is required for this event. Call the Council on 3403 8888 to reserve a slot.
Support for domestic violence in Brisbane is amplifying. The Women’s Legal Service QLD recently received its biggest donation so far, $340,000 from Hand Heart Pocket, and most of it will be allocated to their services in Annerley.
Hand Heart Pocket is the charity of the Freemasons Queensland. With this donation, the organisation will be able to add 2,000 more free legal appointments for victims of domestic violence.
The money will be spent in building new facilities in Annerley and other parts of Queensland to widen their reach. Six conditional, air-conditioned offices will be built in these areas.
The generous donation will also let the organisation become more accessible to volunteers and their clients.
Hand Heart Pocket chief executive Gary Mark said that they are all for supporting women as it is an important part of their long-term strategy. They also continue to help fund other organisations that have limited budgets.
Earlier this month, as part the Festival 2018, the One Million Stars project was showcased in King George Square as an effort to end domestic violence. The mind and heart behind the project is renowned artist Maryann Talia Pau in collaboration with the Museum of Brisbane.
Photo credit: http://www.onemillionstars.net/
The project aims to create peace, joy, and solidarity and to also encourage people into conversations that will bring comfort and solutions to those affected.
Occupying a formerly abandoned building on Annerley Road, Penny Coffee Co is a welcome addition to Dutton Park.
What once was a dilapidated building has been transformed into a modern and contemporary cafe. The cafe, which recently opened in March 2018, is owned by Geoff Grundy who has a great deal of experience in the Melbourne coffee scene. He finally decided to open his own when he came across the perfect location, an abandoned building that housed a photo-developing studio.
Through Penny Coffee Co, Mr Grundy wants to deliver the best of food and coffee in Brissy. The cafe offers an all-day breakfast menu, which focuses on Australia’s local flora and modern eats.
Their french toast is also a hit with the guests. It uses a cinnamon brioche served with poached stone fruit, toasted almonds, chocolate soil topped with malted honeycomb ice cream.
Avocado demand in the whole nation is strong. However, some cafes such as the Dudley Street Espresso in Annerley and a West End cafe have taken avo off their menu due to the high wholesale price in the past few weeks.
In recent weeks, avo prices have skyrocketed due to a drop in supply. The average price of avocados are normally somewhere between $40-60 per tray. Right now, suppliers are asking for at least $100 for 20 avocados. Coles and Woolworths are selling avocados at almost $4 per piece, a price that locals find high, particularly given the quality of currently available stock.
Some cafes use avo on most of their food offerings, which makes it difficult for them to take it off their menu. If this price hike continues, cafe owners will be forced to charge higher for food with avo on them, also quite difficult either way.
Avocado Australia quickly responded to the growing issue and said that most of the current supplies come from New Zealand. The harvests from NZ were light and finished early. The Christmas season as well as the nature of the avocado crops along with the summer peak have created a tight supply for it.
John Tyas, the CEO of Avocado Australia acknowledged the supply and demand problem this year but reassured the market that towards the end of February, the volume is expected normalise versus the demand.
He also said that demand for the fruit grows every year and it’s really a struggle at the start of every year to get them at reasonable prices.
In Annerley, there is a “groovy” cafe that is a favourite amongst locals, the Groove Cafe.
The cafe’s eclectic decor creates a sense of comfort that blends well with the bright colours of orange, yellow, red, and teal. The focal point of the interior? The wood-panelled 1950’s booths mixed with adornments such as flying ducks, fish bowls and board games. They also have bistro-syle seating on a “grassy” patch for that casual al fresco vibe.
Photo credit: Groove Cafe / Facebook
They offer breakfast and lunch that are served in generous helpings.
Don’t miss out on their eggs ben, which is the bomb and has just been featured as one of the best eggs benny in Brisbane last year on Style Magazines.
Photo credit: mealereviews / Instagram
For lunch, their burgers paired with thick milkshakes are to die for!
It’s no wonder this is a favourite in the area. A hearty fare to keep you full.
The 29th of January is Kerbside Collection Day for Annerley and residents are urged to start preparing for this annual exodus of items from their homes.
A week before the collection date, you can start placing your items outside your house or by the kerb.
Here are the stuff that you can put out:
Less than 1.5 metres of wood products
Bikes, sports equipment
Discarded household items
Small appliances
Rugs & carpets
Computers
Televisions
Do not put these stuff out:
Garden waste
Car parts
Glass or mirror
Food scraps
Commercial or building waste
Hazardous materials or gas bottles
The Rules:
Keep everything contained and no larger than 2 cubic metres
Take the doors off of items with doors
No sharp or dangerous objects
Secure your boxes
Now, before you throw anything away, there are actually other options you can explore.
If some of your items could still be useful to other people, may be you can donate it to an op shop. In Annerley there are plenty of op shops where you can go to such as The Asthma Foundation, Lifeline, and Vinnies. This will help you get rid of your items and at the same time, help someone else.
On the other hand, for items that are not acceptable for kerbside pick-up, do NOT leave them by the kerb. Instead, you can drop them off at resource recovery centres in Willawong, Chandler, Ferny Grove or Nudgee. Find out more about them here.
