City Botanic Gardens master plan

The City Botanic Gardens is an historic 18 hectare riverfront park located right in the heart of our growing city centre. Over its lifetime, the gardens have been a source of education, entertainment and enjoyment for the people of Brisbane. The City Botanic Gardens Master Plan 2015 will help to
preserve the history of the park while planning for and managing future demands that will be placed on this unique inner-city open space. As Brisbane emerges as Australia’s New World City, the next 20 years will see an increase in the number of people visiting, living and working in the city centre.
Projections suggest that every day 150,000 workers, 8900 residents and 9000 tourists will find their way to the city centre, increasing demands on the city’s open spaces, including the City Botanic Gardens. Improving access to this inner-city reach of the Brisbane River will become important as projects such the Queens Wharf precinct bring new vitality to the Gardens Point area of the city centre.
Brisbane City Council’s City Centre Master Plan 2014 sets the vision for an open city centre that celebrates our outdoor, subtropical lifestyle. Council’s 2013 Ideas Fiesta informed the development of that plan by encouraging the Brisbane community to explore the future of our city centre. Close to 16,500 people attended 27 community events to share their ideas and feedback. Through the fiesta, the community told us that the City Botanic Gardens is highly valued as a leafy, green, tranquil sanctuary from the busy urban life of the city and that a major threat to this was over-commercialisation. Council’s River’s Edge Strategy 2013 identified opportunities to improve the way we use the inner-city reaches of our river. The Brisbane City Centre Master Plan and River’s Edge Strategy inform the planning challenge for the City Botanic Gardens. We need to plan to accommodate growing demand for green, open space in the inner city while renewing the gardens as a place of knowledge, sanctuary, entertainment and activity. The gardens need to be easily accessible by all and offer experiences that underpin a global reputation.