By Will Murray
Gaja Kerry Charlton is a signatory to five challenges to the Victoria Park stadium project. (ABC News: Will Murray)
In short:
Advocates are urging the Queensland government to pause construction at Victoria Park until challenges under the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Heritage Protection Act can be assessed.
A new report has also found the site's status as a spring complex will not survive development and ancient trees cannot be replaced.
What's next?
The park will change from council to Games Independent Infrastructure and Coordination Authority (GIICA) ownership on Monday, but excavators and fencing are already on site.
Brisbane's Victoria Park will not become the construction site for a new Olympic stadium until Monday, but despite unresolved legal challenges, bulldozers and excavators are already lining up.
The fencing and excavators began appearing at the hotly contested site earlier this week.
It's indicative of the Queensland government's eagerness to push ahead with building the centrepiece of the 2032 Games as soon as the park passes from the control of the Brisbane City Council to the Games Independent Infrastructure and Coordination Authority (GIICA) on June 1.
"The time for talk is over, the time for action is now," Queensland Deputy Premier Jarrod Bleijie declared yesterday.
An artist's impression of the new Brisbane Stadium at Victoria Park. (Supplied: Queensland Government)
But Yagara Elder Gaja (Aunty) Kerry Charlton, a signatory to five challenges to the stadium project under the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Heritage Protection (ATSIHP) Act, said the application was still being assessed by Federal Environment Minister Murray Watt.
"We're still in the Section 10 process and they've started putting up fences," she said.
Under Section 10, Senator Watt could halt development if he is satisfied the park is a significant Aboriginal area, and under threat of injury or desecration.
But the federal department has no power to stop construction work while the applications are outstanding, and there is no timeline as to when a decision will be made.
Excavators are on-site and ready to begin work on the Victoria Park stadium from Monday. (ABC News: Will Murray)
Even if they win, Gaja Kerry believes significant damage could be done to the park between Monday and a decision.
She is asking GIICA and the state government to delay the 'bulldozers and excavators' until Minister Watt has his say, but is not optimistic.
On Thursday, Mr Bleijie said the government would not push back the demolition.
"No way, we are good to go," he said.
"We are going for this, because Queenslanders expect us to get on with the job and start building this stuff."
"I don't think there's been much respect shown for the process by (Minister Bleijie),"Gaja Kerry said.
The park will be fenced off and closed to the public from June 1. (ABC News: Will Murray)
The last hope
The ATSIHP Act challenges are seen as the best opportunity for those opposed to the Victoria Park stadium to have it stopped, after the project was made exempt from state planning laws and cleared on environmental grounds.
"We have records of our ancestors here, and the lived experience of my mother's generation, my grandparents' generation, my great-grandparents' generation," Gaja Kerry said.
"Many of these trees pre-date European settlement. Our totems are all around here. In the trees, the habitats, the ecosystems.
"Kippa ceremonies were held here, so rites of passage from childhood to teenage years."
The Victoria Park stadium project was made exempt from state planning laws and cleared on environmental grounds. (ABC News: Will Murray)
The mood of the signatories has recently received a boost, thanks to a report by hydrogeologist Ned Hamer.
"There are a number of springs here, we call it a springs complex," Mr Hamer said.
"(Victoria Park) is where the rainfall lands on the recharge area for the springs, infiltrates through the soil profile and into the fractured rock aquifer beneath us.
"It then discharges in the lower parts of the landscape as clear, fresh water."
Large expanses of open parkland like Victoria Park are now rare in Brisbane, and Mr Hamer said it is the city's last remaining spring complex.
Ned Hamer says Victoria Park is Brisbane's last spring complex and holds significant ecological value. (ABC News: Will Murray)
He said its value was understood by Aboriginal people and early European settlers alike.
"This area, Barrambin-Victoria Park, was mapped and gazetted as a water reserve and a recreational reserve in the 1840s," Mr Hamer said.
"That's pretty much equivalent to national park status these days."
The report found the spring system continues to flow year-round and in drought, making it of significant ecological value.
It also noted the importance of this water source to First Nations people, who regard springs as sacred.
Waterways at the lower end of Victoria Park will be impacted by the stadium build, according to hydrogeologist Ned Hamer. (ABC News: Will Murray)
From a dump, to a golf course
Victoria Park was used as a golf course from the 1930s until 2021.
The Queensland Government has said it plans to revitalise the parts of the park not taken up by stadium and keep sections as open space for the public to enjoy.
Mr Bleijie has previously said under-utilisation of the park was why it was suited to development.
Jarrod Bleijie says excavators and bulldozers will begin work at Victoria Park from Monday. (ABC News: Lucas Hill)
"It was a dump, then it was a golf course, so people weren't carrying a blankie and having a picnic at the golf course, because they would've got killed with golf balls hitting them in the head," he said in November.
But there were plans to improve the park before the stadium proposition.
When Brisbane City Council closed the golf course in 2021 it was in preparation to enact their master plan for the site, which sought to celebrate its cultural significance and natural waterways.
The previous plan for revitalising Victoria Park included efforts to preserve its cultural significance and natural waterways. (ABC News: Will Murray)
Mr Hamer said the council's plan would have preserved the park's natural assets, but the stadium would not.
"You can't replace big old trees," he said.
"You can't have a spring without catchment area.
"A stadium would completely diminish and extinguish the source of water for the springs."
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