Brisbane Footpath Safety Audit - $50 million needed

Brisbane City Council needs $50 million to provide safe footpaths if problems identified in an audit could be remedied. The report was "Secret Council Business" until the Courier Mail could afford a Freedom from Information search.
Courier Mail report - footpath safety

Wide, safe footpaths are a basic service appreciated in communities.

Edges that fall away dangerously, footpaths being sabotaged with advertising signs, planting trees that someone should know will result in constant repair and hazard ... are avoidable problems. Council continues planting trees that would thrive in front yards or in parks and open spaces rather than narrow footpaths.

Leopard trees dropping hundreds of hard seed pods for the elderly to skid on, for cars to crunch over are a poor choice for busy streets. (I love Leopard trees and even advocate consideration of collecting the seeds to set them free in areas of lantana and large degraded areas ... but not on busy footpaths.)

Riding Road at Bulimba provides a good example. Paperbark trees might have been a good idea at the time but now they create a serious risk. Hundreds of kids use those footpaths, on bikes and on foot. Trees taking half a narrow footpath with two schools and thousands of vehicles passing every day is not providing the best outcome.Constant mangling of the trees when replacing the concrete or when "Edward Energex Scissorhands" is loosed to perform his sculpture tricks makes the area unique, but at a cost.

In my opinion ... they were the wrong tree to plant on a footpath on a busy street, under low lying infrastructure cables.

Halting footpath tree planting of trees Council knows damage concrete would give time to determine which footpaths have adequate space to have trees planted.

Tree planting could focus first on areas where the trees can grow properly to achieve their potential.

Some raving on about footpaths …

Sabotaging local footpaths for profit

Safer bus stop for Wecker Road

Footpath tree planting – get it right and save thousands

Secret Council Business