Brisbane City Council has approved a new development on flood-prone land. 

Twenty hectares of riverfront land in Brisbane's east is to be transformed into a suburban precinct of more than 850 new homes, after being sold off by the Department of Defence in 2020 to private developers Shayher Group for $63 million. 

The ‘Bulimba Barracks’ precinct plan includes new riverfront parks, sportsfields and the remediation of Tugulawa Park, surrounded by two- to three-storey townhouses, five-storey apartment buildings and detached homes.

However, given the history of flooding in the area, the developers applied to fill in the entire site with earth to raise it above flood levels.

“The whole site will be the subject of earthwork filling to remove the risk of flood inundation and effectively manage stormwater flow across the site,” an assessment report said.

Brisbane City Council has now approved that plan, with Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner saying “anything will have to be built in a way to respond to the flood challenges on that site”.

The Brisbane River Strategic Floodplain Management Plan describes the Brisbane River floodplain as “the most flood-impacted area in Australia”, which is “estimated to have the largest number of existing buildings of any floodplain in Australia”.

“As well as increasing the population that would be exposed to flood risk, future development within the floodplain could modify flood behaviour,” it says.

The approval comes a week after Gabba Ward councillor Jonathan Sriranganathan asked the council to amend the City Plan 2014 to “limit all new residential, mixed use, industrial and commercial development proposals” on floodplains.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese last month called for a stop to all development on floodplains.

But Cr Schrinner says the council has already limited building on flood-prone land through requirements to incorporate mitigation measures.