A huge development project is being planned with the intention of transforming Queensland’s Sunshine Coast into a global tourist destination.
Local businessman Professor Clive Palmer has announced plans for a huge development including a new Sunshine Coast International Airport, a new beachfront hotel, retail complex, convention centre, casino, theme park, water park, aviary and aquarium. The new facilities will be built on the site of the existing Palmer Coolum Resort.
A key part of the project would be the development of Sunshine Coast Airport which Professor Palmer said would be “capable of taking A380s and 747 jumbo jets from Singapore, Beijing and Tokyo directly to the Sunshine Coast”.
“This will significantly boost the region’s capacity to accommodate both domestic and international visitors and it will create enormous interest in a country such as China and its growing tourism market,” he said, adding that the airport would be linked to the new resort complex by monorail.
The new beachfront hotels will hold approximately 1,000 rooms, while the convention centre will be designed to hold 5,000 people. Professor Palmer also stated his aim to develop “an aviary to accommodate multiple species of native Australian birds… a beachside water park and a theme park”.
“We will spend the next six months seeing if the community wants the Sunshine Coast to lead the world. The construction phase would take approximately three years,” he added.
In the 12 months ending 31 March 2012, the Sunshine Coast attracted 3.08 million tourists, of which only 237,000 came from overseas. By contrast, the more popular Gold Coast attracted 4.05m tourists over the same period, including 740,000 international visitors.