Brisbane Archives - Forest Lake News

Rain All Week, Clear Skies on the Day: Calamvale Park’s Yoga Celebration Draws the Crowds

Calamvale District Park filled with practitioners of all ages and backgrounds for the twelfth International Day of Yoga, with the community turning out in strong numbers despite heavy rain in the days leading up to the event.

The open air celebration was organised by Divya Jyoti Jagrati Sansthan Australia and marked a decade of annual Yoga Day events the organisation has held in the Calamvale area. After a week of wet weather that raised concerns about attendance, the skies cleared on the morning of the event, and participants gathered across the park for a morning of guided yoga, breathing exercises and meditation.

For Calamvale residents, the park is a familiar gathering place, and the Yoga Day event has become one of the more consistent fixtures in the area’s community calendar over the past ten years.

A decade of bringing the community to the mat

DJJS Australia has been running Yoga Day celebrations in the Calamvale area since 2016, building the event steadily into what has become one of Brisbane’s longer running outdoor yoga gatherings. The organisation noted that it has maintained a long standing partnership with local community representatives in promoting yoga and wellbeing initiatives in the area.

The ten year run is significant. Community events of this type often peak once or twice and then fade. Sustaining a consistent annual presence in one location, drawing new participants alongside returning ones, takes genuine organisational commitment and community trust.

Despite heavy rain throughout the week and on the night before the event, people from various backgrounds and communities turned up and participated with great enthusiasm, organisers said.

More than a workout in the park

International Day of Yoga, observed annually on 21 June, was established by the United Nations in 2014 following a proposal by India. It has since grown into one of the most widely observed wellness observances in the world, with events held in cities across more than 190 countries each year. The recent Brisbane edition marked the twelfth time the day has been celebrated globally.

In Australia, urban communities with significant South Asian diaspora populations have often taken the lead in hosting public Yoga Day events, bringing together experienced practitioners alongside community members who may be attending their first session. The Calamvale event has followed this inclusive model, drawing participants from across the suburb’s culturally diverse residential population each year.

DJJS, or Divya Jyoti Jagrati Sansthan, is a spiritual and social organisation with a global presence that runs welfare, educational and cultural programmes across several countries. Its Australian chapter has been active in Brisbane’s south west through both the annual Yoga Day event and broader community wellbeing initiatives.

Calamvale District Park as a community gathering space

Calamvale District Park is bordered by established trees and offers a range of open air facilities including a basketball half court, barbecue areas, an off leash dog area and a large adventure playground. The park’s open lawn areas make it well suited to large group activities, and it has been used for a wide range of community events beyond the yoga celebration.

For residents looking to explore yoga beyond the annual event, DJJS Australia maintains an online presence and can be found at djjs.org.

Published 19-June-2026

Electric Vehicle Numbers Surge in Calamvale

iStock

The southern suburbs of Calamvale and Forest Lake sit in a part of Brisbane where car ownership is almost universal and public transport alternatives are limited. This heavy reliance on driving makes Calamvale’s position among Brisbane’s highest total EV counts all the more striking.

The suburb registers significantly more electric vehicles than its income profile alone would suggest, placing it alongside Sunnybank Hills, West End, and Carindale as an area where EV adoption has outpaced the predictions built around wealth and socioeconomic status.

A suburb that doesn’t fit the usual EV profile

Research on electric vehicle uptake consistently points to the same leading indicators, namely high household income, a detached home with a garage, and the ability to absorb a higher upfront purchase cost. Suburbs like Upper Brookfield, Fig Tree Pocket, Bardon, and Chapel Hill tick all three boxes cleanly and lead Brisbane in EV proportion as a result.

Calamvale does not sit at the same socioeconomic level as those western suburbs, yet its raw EV numbers remain remarkably high. Associate Professor Gavin Northey from Griffith University has raised a theory for why this is happening.

“In suburbs like Calamvale and Sunnybank Hills, for example, nearly a third of all residents share some Chinese ancestry,” he said. “In these suburbs, there may be some form of ‘country-of-origin’ effect, where it’s really quite natural to have Chinese-manufactured EVs in their consideration set.”

Chinese EV brands, led by BYD, have become the dominant force at the lower and mid-range end of the Australian EV market. A purpose-built BYD vessel docked in Melbourne last month carrying 5,000 vehicles, a shipment described by one energy analyst as a turning point in Australian motoring. According to the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries, almost one in seven cars sold across Australia in March was an EV.

Northey is careful to frame this as a plausible explanation rather than a confirmed cause. Multiple factors overlap in suburbs like Calamvale, including housing type, commuting patterns, and fuel cost sensitivity.

Forest Lake and the car dependent equation

Forest Lake sits to the west of Calamvale and shares many of its planning characteristics, operating as a residential hub built around the private car where local streets feed arterial roads and residents have limited rail access. This car dependency has historically been one of the strongest arguments in favour of EV uptake. If residents must drive regardless, the fuel savings from switching to electric become significant relatively quickly.

Macquarie University economics Associate Professor Rohan Best points to upfront cost as the primary remaining barrier.

“The upfront cost is one of the primary barriers to whether people can afford it or not, it’s still quite high relative to petrol cars,” he said. “It does tend to be those of higher socioeconomic backgrounds who can afford it.”

That constraint is shifting. Salary sacrifice arrangements have made EVs accessible to a wider income range, and the arrival of BYD and other Chinese manufacturers at lower price points has widened the market well beyond early adopters.

Across most of Brisbane, standard hybrid vehicles still outnumber full EVs in most suburbs. Northey describes plug-in electric hybrids in particular as a transitional technology for households not yet ready to commit fully, offering lower fuel costs without the range anxiety and charging logistics that still deter some buyers.

For southern Brisbane residents in areas like Forest Lake and Calamvale where longer commutes are typical, the cost-per-kilometre advantage of a full EV over time remains one of the more compelling arguments in the category.

Published 18-June-2026

Gold, Bronze and a Bright Future: Forest Lake Student Shines at National Judo Championships

Shin Gi Tai Judo Club/Facebook

Ella, a Year 7 student at Forest Lake State High School, has returned from the 2026 Australian Judo National Championships with two medals, claiming gold in Junior Kata and bronze in the Under 13 Over 56kg division at the Gold Coast Sports and Leisure Centre, Carrara.

The national championships ran from 5 to 8 June, bringing together the country’s best young judo athletes across shiai combat and kata disciplines. Kata competition was held on 5 June, with Under 13 competition on 7 June, meaning Ella competed across multiple days and across two fundamentally different aspects of the sport.

Winning both is no straightforward achievement. Shiai is judo’s competitive fighting format, contested by weight category against opponents from across the country. Kata is an entirely separate discipline: a precisely choreographed sequence of techniques performed with a partner, judged on accuracy, control and the quality of the movement.

Excelling in both on a national stage, as a Year 7 student, speaks to a level of commitment well beyond casual club participation.

*Photo Credit: Shin Gi Tai Judo Club/Facebook*

The club that brought her to this point

Ella trains under Sensei Srdjan Andjelkovic at Shin Gi Tai Judo Club, with additional mentorship from his son Nick Andjelkovic. Nick’s connection to the Forest Lake community runs deep: a former Forest Lake State High School student, he now returns to the school regularly to share his experience with current students, passing on the knowledge and discipline he built through his own judo journey.

The name Shin Gi Tai is itself a statement of philosophy. It refers to three of judo’s foundational principles: body, spirit and technique. A club built around that framework tends to produce athletes who understand that physical skill alone is not the point.

What comes next

Ella’s next competitions include the Australian National School Championships in Queensland in September, which will be held in tandem with the Queensland International Open. Both events will put her back on the mat against national-level competition within months of her gold and bronze medal results.

For Forest Lake State High School, Ella’s achievements reflect what the school’s own framework of academic and personal excellence looks like in practice. Judo demands exactly what the classroom does: focused attention, the capacity to learn from failure, and the willingness to show up and go again.

Forest Lake locals can follow Shin Gi Tai Judo Club and upcoming competition news through Judo Queensland at judoqueensland.org.au.

Published 16-June-2026

Two Local Students Are About to Become the First in Their Families to Go to University

Ms Margie Nightingale/Facebook

Shahd from Forest Lake State High School and Salman from Glenala State High School have been named the 2026 recipients of the First-in-Family Bursary, a local initiative designed to help young people take the step into higher education when no one in their family has done it before them.

Both students will be the first in their families to attend university, a milestone that carries a particular kind of weight. There is no parent who has been through orientation week, no sibling who can explain how HECS works, no family shorthand for navigating the early months of a university degree.

The bursary exists precisely for students in that position, covering the upfront costs that can derail a capable student before they even begin: textbooks, technology, equipment and other essentials.

For Shahd and Salman, the recognition is a signal that the talent and determination they have brought to their studies at Forest Lake State High School and Glenala State High School respectively has not gone unnoticed in their own community.

Two Schools, Two Suburbs, One Step That Changes Everything

Forest Lake State High School has served the western suburbs of Brisbane since 2001, building a reputation across academic and sporting programmes for over 1,600 students in Years 7 to 12. The school draws from a broad and diverse community, and Shahd’s selection reflects the kind of academic drive the school works to cultivate.

First-in-Family bursary — *Photo Credit: Ms Margie Nightingale/Facebook*

Glenala State High School in Durack has been a cornerstone of the Inala and Forest Lake area since 1996, formed from the amalgamation of Inala State High School and Richlands State High School. Its motto, “Believe and Achieve,” and its four core values of respect and responsibility, commitment to learning, pride and perseverance frame a school that serves some of Brisbane’s most culturally diverse communities. Salman’s path to university through Glenala is the kind of story that school motto was written for.

*Photo Credit: Ms Margie Nightingale/Facebook*

Both schools sit within the same community, a south-western Brisbane corridor where families from many different cultural and linguistic backgrounds have built their lives, and where being the first in a family to attend university is not unusual. It is, in many of these households, a quiet aspiration held for years before someone finally makes it real.

Helping Students Get Started

The bursary targets that gap directly, providing recipients with a one-off payment to establish a financial foundation. By covering these initial costs, the initiative ensures students focus on their studies rather than their bank balances from day one. The intent is not just to support the two individuals receiving it but to open a pathway for the generations that follow.

This practical support addresses a significant hurdle. Textbooks, a laptop, software licences, transport costs and enrolment fees can add up to hundreds or even thousands of dollars in the first weeks of semester. For a student without family experience in higher education, there is often no roadmap for managing those early expenses.

“Being the first in a family to attend university can be daunting, but with the right support and encouragement, it can also be life-changing,” the bursary announcement noted.

A Community Initiative from a Local Who Knows the Path

The First-in-Family Bursary is a personal initiative of Ms Margie Nightingale, the local member for the Inala electorate, which covers Forest Lake and the surrounding suburbs. Ms Nightingale has deep roots in the area, having grown up in Inala, attended local schools and raised her family in the community. She was herself the first in her family to attend university, a connection to this bursary that goes beyond policy.

The bursary reflects a view of community that is anchored in long-term investment: that supporting one student through a financial barrier at the right moment can ripple forward through families and communities for decades. Both Shahd and Salman represent, in Ms Nightingale’s words, “the talent, determination and potential that exists right in our electorate.”

Forest Lake State High School can be contacted at admin@forestlakeshs.eq.edu.au. Glenala State High School can be reached at admin@glenalashs.eq.edu.au.

Published 25-April-2026

Forest Lake Teen Sabina Locke Is Already Learning How to Balance Ambition with Direction

Kids Star International 2026/Facebook

Fifteen-year-old Sabina Locke is making her mark on the Queensland pageant scene, having already secured a first runner-up finish in the teen division at Face of Australia Queensland. After traveling to Bangkok, Thailand, where she earned a massive medal haul at Kids Star International, the Forest Lake local is now preparing to take to the national stage this April for the Miss Teen Galaxy Australia competition.

At a young age, Sabina is proving that pageantry is about far more than just sashes and stage lights. Balancing her secondary school exams with a packed community schedule, she is using the stage to build her confidence and forge lasting connections. While she already has her sights set on university, Sabina’s current focus is firmly on the future opportunities her successes might bring, from modelling to community advocacy.

From Forest Lake to the International Stage

Her journey through the Galaxy system emphasizes real-world skills like public speaking, interview techniques, and community involvement. This April, she steps onto the national stage for the Miss Teen Galaxy Australia competition, continuing a rapid rise that has already seen her represent her community abroad. Her previous success at Kids Star International in Bangkok saw her compete against a global field including entrants from Bulgaria, Thailand, and the Philippines where she secured a significant medal haul for her talent, catwalk, and costume.

Sabina Locke — *Photo Credit: Kids Star International 2026/Facebook*

Her placement as Runner Up at Face of Australia Queensland, one of Brisbane’s most prominent multicultural pageants, preceded her Galaxy journey and helped lay the groundwork for the confidence and platform skills she brought to the international stage. Face of Australia Queensland has grown steadily since its 2019 inauguration, placing a strong emphasis on empowerment, diversity and community connection, values that clearly resonated with Sabina’s own approach.

Her friends from the competition have been quick to support her, and she credits the connections she has built through pageantry as one of the most meaningful aspects of the experience. “Everything I have earned has been a new learning experience for me and I hope that continues with the years to come,” she said.

More Than a Title

What sets Sabina apart is the way she has translated pageant participation into tangible community action. She is a regular at the local op shop and gives her time to Wendy’s Community Care. Both commitments point to a young woman who sees her platform not as something to display but as something to use.

Her advocacy interests are growing in focus too. Sabina has begun engaging more seriously with youth mental health, attending events and exploring how she can contribute to that space in a meaningful way. She is also planning to participate in Brisbane’s International Women’s Day Fun Run, with a particular gesture that says a lot about her character: rather than keeping her ticket, she intends to give it to someone who needs it.

Eyes on What Comes Next

While Sabina Locke is clear-eyed about her future, she is currently a 15-year-old student balancing her pageant commitments with secondary school exams. She hopes to attend university after finishing school while continuing to build her presence in the pageant world. Sabina views these experiences as a way to gain skills in public speaking, community service, and traditional runway categories that will open doors for future modelling and media opportunities. She remains focused on the learning process, noting that everything she has earned so far has been a new experience she hopes to build on in the years to come.

The Galaxy system she competes in provides a genuine pathway for that ambition. Sabina is now putting her energy into April’s national competition, where she will represent her community on the Australian stage. Community support has already begun to grow around her, and she has secured local sponsorship from a skincare clinic and a traditional Filipino clothing boutique.

For more information about Australia Galaxy Pageants and the 2026 national final, visit australiagalaxypageants.com.

Published 10-April-2026

Pallara District Sports Park Early Works to Begin as Construction Moves to Late 2026

BCC

Early works on the Pallara District Sports Park at 65 Van Dieren Road are set to get underway from late March 2026, with main construction now scheduled to begin in late 2026, subject to weather conditions and approvals.

The February 2026 concept plan update confirms a revised timeline for the project, following the release of the final concept plan in November 2025. At that time, planners expected construction to begin in early 2026. The updated schedule sets out a two-stage delivery approach, with preparatory civil works on Van Dieren Road starting first before main construction of the park begins later in the year. Pallara and Forest Lake families who have followed the project since community engagement began in October 2023 continue to wait, although works are now set to commence on site.

Early Works

From late March 2026, early works will include building new kerb and channel and footpath on Van Dieren Road, planting new street trees, and installing a new stormwater outlet pipe in J.M. Sullivan Park. These civil works prepare the site’s surrounds and drainage infrastructure ahead of the larger construction effort later in the year. Residents near Van Dieren Road can expect some temporary changes in the area during this period, with a further update promised before works begin.

The early works phase reflects the complexity of delivering a district-level sporting facility from the ground up in a rapidly developing suburb. Eight properties along Van Dieren Road have already been purchased for the sports park and bushland conservation, a process that has been underway for several years as the site was assembled from multiple private landholdings. That land acquisition groundwork now gives the project a clear path to construction.

Final Concept Plan

The final concept plan, released in late 2025 and updated in February 2026, sets out a district-level sports and recreation facility designed to serve Pallara, Forest Lake and the broader southwest Brisbane community. The park will deliver two outdoor sports fields, a clubhouse with public amenities creating a central hub for players, families and visitors, on-site parking and a dedicated bus drop-off, sports lighting and irrigation to support evening use and quality playing surfaces, and a future playground area and picnic facilities site.

Pallara District Sports Park — *Photo Credit: BCC*

The concept plan also incorporates shared pathways, spectator areas, team shelters and water tanks for irrigation. The design responds directly to what Pallara residents told planners during the 2023 and 2024 community engagement rounds, with safe and clean facilities, good amenities, strong access and sufficient parking all identified as community priorities. Local clubs will be identified through future tender processes once construction is closer to completion.

Why This Matters to Pallara and Forest Lake

Pallara’s growth over the past decade has been extraordinary. According to the 2021 census, Pallara had 3,861 residents, a significant increase from the 511 recorded in 2016, and residential development has continued at pace since then, with multiple house and land estates delivered along Van Dieren Road itself. That growth has placed real pressure on the suburb’s recreational infrastructure, with families currently relying on parks and sporting facilities in neighbouring Forest Lake, Durack and Calamvale to meet their needs.

The Pallara District Sports Park directly addresses that gap. For local sporting clubs, the arrival of a district-level home ground with two lit playing fields, a clubhouse and proper amenities opens the door to formalising and growing their presence in the southwest Brisbane corridor. For families, it means a quality community space within the suburb rather than a drive across the city. And for Pallara as a whole, a well-designed district park anchors the suburb’s social infrastructure in a way that purely residential development cannot.

The Pallara District Sports Park also forms part of the broader Pallara Open Space Network Corridor, with further stages subject to future funding and planning processes as the suburb continues to grow.

Project Timeline and Contact

The current project schedule runs from early works in late March 2026 through to main construction commencing in late 2026, with the overall project timeframe extending through to 2028. Residents can expect further updates from the project team before each works phase begins.

For enquiries about the Pallara District Sports Park, the project team can be reached on 07 3178 5413 during business hours or on 07 3403 8888 at any time. Email enquiries can be sent to cityprojects@brisbane.qld.gov.au. Further information is available here.

Published 3-April-2026.

Inala’s Inspire Youth and Family Services Launches Community-Led Program to Redirect At-Risk Youth

Inspire Youth and Family Services

In the face of growing concern over youth crime across Brisbane, Inspire Youth and Family Services, has secured a Kickstarter early intervention grant to deliver a new community-led program in Inala aimed at redirecting at-risk young people before offending escalates.

Based at 79 Poinsettia Street, the initiative, dubbed the Inspire Positive Redirection Program, is geared towards guiding young people aged 8 to 17 in the southwest Brisbane suburb who are already showing signs of antisocial or early criminal behaviour.

The program combines mentoring, family support and community engagement to help participants build positive life pathways before disengagement becomes entrenched.

It forms part of a broader round of four Kickstarter-funded early intervention initiatives across Greater Brisbane, with Inspire Youth and Family Services joining three other community organisations sharing more than $1 million in total funding.

Turning the Tide on Youth Crime

It comes as early intervention and rehabilitation are starting to turn the tide on Labor’s Youth Crime Crisis, delivering a 7.2 per cent drop in the number of victims of crime in 2025.

“We introduced our tough Adult Crime, Adult Time laws to hold offenders to account but, we are also investing in early intervention because it’s a critical step to stop youth from falling into a life of crime,” Minister for Youth Justice and Victim Support Laura Gerber said.

“Addressing the early signs of disengagement, anti-social or criminal behaviour is critical to breaking the cycle of crime and putting youth back on the right track.

“We are delivering safety where you live with tough laws, more police, early intervention, and rehabilitation to break Labor’s cycle of crime for good.”

Community-led initiatives — *Photo Credit: IYS*

A Service Built From the Ground Up in Inala

Inspire Youth and Family Services has operated in Inala for more than 35 years, making it one of the longest-standing youth support organisations in southwest Brisbane. The organisation works with children and young people from birth to 25 years of age, offering a multidisciplinary mix of services that spans educational re-engagement, youth housing and homelessness support, bail and court support, family case management and school-based youth welfare.

Each year, more than 400 young people access the organisation’s medium-term transitional accommodation, while its bail support services work with young people in contact with the justice system to help stabilise their circumstances and reduce the risk of reoffending.

Among its most recognisable community assets is The Hut, a youth outreach centre located in DJ Sherrington Park in Inala. The Hut provides a safe and creative space for young people aged 12 to 25, running educational workshops, facilitated discussions and creative engagement programs throughout the year.

That kind of embedded, accessible infrastructure sets Inspire apart from externally delivered programs, giving the organisation a genuine understanding of the community it serves and the trust of the families and young people who rely on it.

A Suburb Shaped by Long-Term Challenges

Inala sits approximately 22 kilometres southwest of Brisbane’s CBD and carries a long history as a planned public housing suburb, established in the early 1950s to address post-war housing shortages. That history has shaped the suburb’s demographics, with socioeconomic disadvantage remaining a real and persistent feature of life for many Inala families.

Forest Lake, the broader ward within which Inala sits, includes a diverse and growing residential population, and while crime across the ward decreased significantly between 2023 and 2024, the underlying pressures that drive youth disengagement remain present.

Inspire Youth and Family Services is not a new presence in Poinsettia Street. It has been part of the suburb’s fabric for decades, operating through the complex social challenges that many southwest Brisbane families navigate.

Families, schools and community members seeking more information about this program can phone on (07) 3372 2655, or email office@iys.org.au, or through the website at iys.org.au.

Published 23-March-2026

Salvos Stores Opens Australia’s First Textile Recovery Facility at Carole Park

Salvos Stores

Salvos Stores has opened Australia’s first automated Textile Recovery Facility at Carole Park, on the boundary of Forest Lake and Brisbane’s south-western industrial corridor, with the site set to process up to 5,000 tonnes of textiles per year and keep millions of items out of landfill.

The facility, which received $4.97 million in Queensland funding, delivers on a plan that was announced under the Project Boomerang initiative and supported by feasibility research from QUT. It is the first of its kind in Australia and draws on the model of an automated textile sorting and decontamination plant already operating in Amsterdam, replicating that technology in a Queensland context for the first time.

The opening marks a significant moment for The Salvation Army’s commercial arm, which has operated Salvos Stores across Australia for more than 140 years. The organisation kept 52 million items in circulation through its network of over 400 stores last year alone, and the Carole Park facility extends that work into a new tier, capturing textiles that cannot be resold in stores and redirecting them into recycling supply chains rather than landfill.

How the Facility Works

The Carole Park facility uses automated sorting and decommissioning technology to process donated textiles that fall below resale quality. The system sorts garments by fibre type, removes buttons and zippers, and prepares materials as feedstock for recycling and manufacturing processes. The result is a cleaner, more commercially viable supply of recycled textile material than manual sorting alone can produce.

Salvos Stores' first textile recovery — *Photo Credit: Salvos Stores*

The facility draws its supply from donations flowing through the broader Salvos Stores network and is designed to pilot and scale textile recovery solutions across Brisbane before expanding its reach. At full capacity, the site will handle up to 5,000 tonnes of textiles annually, generating additional revenue that feeds back into The Salvation Army’s frontline service programmes across the country.

The project has attracted support from a number of significant corporate partners looking to develop local supply chains and markets for recycled textile materials, including Kmart Group, Samsara Eco and Full Circle Fibres. Charitable Recycling Australia has also been involved in the collaborative structure underpinning the initiative. QUT’s feasibility research helped establish the technical and commercial case for the facility before the investment decision was made.

The Scale of Australia’s Textile Waste Problem

The Carole Park facility arrives at a moment when the scale of Australia’s textile waste challenge is becoming harder to ignore. More than 200,000 tonnes of clothing ends up in landfill in Australia each year, a figure that reflects both the volume of fast fashion entering the market and the limited infrastructure available to process garments at end of life. Most donated clothing that cannot be resold has historically had few options beyond landfill or export to lower-income markets, neither of which constitutes a sustainable long-term solution.

The circular economy model that underpins the Carole Park facility offers a different pathway. Rather than treating unsaleable textiles as waste, the facility treats them as raw material. Fibres recovered through the sorting and decommissioning process can re-enter manufacturing supply chains, reducing demand for virgin materials and closing the loop between consumption and production. The Amsterdam facility on which the Carole Park plant is modelled has demonstrated that this approach is commercially viable at scale, and the Queensland site is designed to replicate and build on that proof of concept.

Head of Salvos Stores Nic Baldwin described the opening as a proud moment reflecting the organisation’s commitment to practical environmental action alongside its longstanding social mission. Business Development Manager Meriel Chamberlin connected the facility to the broader Salvos Stores story, noting that the organisation has spent over 140 years turning second-hand goods into hope through its stores and that the recovery facility represents a new expression of that same purpose.

Why This Matters to the Forest Lake and Carole Park Community

For residents of Forest Lake, Carole Park and the surrounding south-western suburbs, the arrival of a nationally significant piece of circular economy infrastructure in their backyard is worth understanding. The facility creates ongoing employment in the local industrial corridor and positions the area as a hub for the kind of sustainable waste management work that is increasingly central to Queensland’s economic future.

More broadly, the facility gives local residents a clearer sense of where their Salvos Store donations go. When a bag of clothes is dropped at a donation point, the garments that cannot be resold now have a destination that keeps them productively in circulation rather than sending them to landfill. That outcome benefits the environment, supports The Salvation Army’s programmes and strengthens the case for donating rather than discarding.

For households across the south-western suburbs who want to reduce their contribution to textile waste, the simplest action remains donating usable and unusable clothing through Salvos Stores rather than placing it in general waste. More information about the Textile Recovery Facility is available at here.

Published 17-March-2026.

Carole Park’s Hypersonix Launch Systems Completes World-First Scramjet Test Flight

Hypersonix Launch Systems, the aerospace company based at 2 Ron Boyle Crescent, Carole Park, has successfully completed the first flight of its Australian-made scramjet-powered hypersonic aircraft, reaching speeds greater than Mach 5 in a mission that marks a landmark moment for Australia’s sovereign aerospace capability.

DART AE, Hypersonix’s 3.5-metre autonomous hypersonic aircraft, lifted off at 7pm US Eastern Time on Friday 27 February, which was 11am AEDT on Saturday 28 February, from Rocket Lab Launch Complex 2 at the Virginia Spaceport Authority’s Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport on Wallops Island, Virginia. The launch window had originally opened on 25 February but a brief delay pushed the flight to 27 February. The mission, named “That’s not a knife” by Rocket Lab and Cassowary Vex by the US Defence Innovation Unit, was conducted on behalf of US defence innovation authorities.

How the SPARTAN Scramjet Engine Works

The mission centred on the SPARTAN scramjet engine, Hypersonix’s proprietary propulsion system manufactured entirely through 3D printing and containing no moving parts. SPARTAN is designed to propel aircraft to speeds of up to Mach 12, the equivalent of 12 times the speed of sound, or 14,500km/h. At the planned deployment point, DART AE separated from the Rocket Lab HASTE rocket and SPARTAN ignited, powering the aircraft through its hypersonic flight profile and gathering technical data for the team to analyse in the coming weeks.

That propulsion technology traces back to Dr Michael Smart, Hypersonix co-founder, former chair of Hypersonic Propulsion at the University of Queensland and former NASA research scientist. Smart said the mission allowed the team to test propulsion, materials and control systems in real hypersonic conditions, and that the results would directly shape the design of future operational hypersonic aircraft. At the speeds and temperatures involved, he said, there is simply no substitute for flight data.

Hypersonix Launch Systems' DART AE — *Photo Credit: Rocket Lab*

Hypersonix chief executive Matt Hill described the flight as confirmation that an Australian company could design, build and operate technology in one of the most demanding flight regimes on Earth, and an important step toward delivering hypersonic systems that are operationally relevant for Australia and its allies.

A Carole Park Operation With Global Ambitions

The Hypersonix Launch Systems team operates from its Carole Park facility across aerospace engineering, advanced manufacturing and flight testing. The company currently employs more than 50 staff in Brisbane, positioning it at the forefront of Australia’s emerging hypersonic industry and making South-East Queensland a genuine hub for what has historically been a domain dominated by a handful of major powers.

That local base has attracted significant international confidence. Hypersonix raised $46 million in a Series A capital raise, led by UK-based investor High Tor Capital with support from European defence company Saab and Polish investment firm RKKVC. The National Reconstruction Fund Corporation and Queensland Investment Corporation also participated, reflecting strong backing from both domestic and international investors in the technology’s commercial and defence applications.

What Comes Next: The VISR Platform

The successful test flight accelerates more than the SPARTAN engine’s development. The capital raise is also fast-tracking Hypersonix’s next reusable hypersonic platform, VISR, short for Velos Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance, while expanding advanced manufacturing capacity in Queensland.

The Hypersonix Launch Systems model positions the company to serve both civil and defence markets as hypersonic technology matures from experimental to operational. With the Carole Park facility serving as the primary engineering and development base, the work to apply the lessons from DART AE’s maiden flight begins here.

Further information about Hypersonix Launch Systems and its programmes is available at hypersonix.com.au. The company operates from 2 Ron Boyle Crescent, Carole Park QLD 4300.

Published 2-March-2026.

Have Your Say, Forest Lake: More Homes, Sooner Consultation Opens

Adrian Schrinner

Forest Lake is one of 18 Brisbane suburbs where planning rules for low-medium density residential zones may change under the More Homes, Sooner initiative, but local residents are making clear that their support for new housing hinges on whether schools, roads and public transport can keep pace with any growth the changes deliver.

The proposed changes to the LMR zone affect pockets of Forest Lake close to public transport stops and the Forest Lake Shopping Centre on Forest Lake Boulevard. Community consultation is open until Friday 20 March 2026. Forest Lake residents have delivered a pointed and practical response, cutting through abstract planning language to ask a question local families face every day: what comes first, the homes or the infrastructure to support them?

A Suburb Already Under Pressure

Developers master-planned Forest Lake from the ground up in 1991 as Brisbane’s first purpose-designed community, creating 7,700 house lots, 120 hectares of parks and the 10.9-hectare recreational lake that defines the suburb’s identity. That deliberate design gave Forest Lake its community character, but it also created fixed infrastructure and a fixed school catchment that is now under genuine strain.

Forest Lake State High School introduced an Enrolment Management Plan in August 2025, meaning the school is operating at or near capacity and is now restricting out-of-catchment enrolments. Families already living in Forest Lake say the suburb’s secondary schooling infrastructure cannot currently absorb significant additional enrolments. Community members have raised this directly in response to the More Homes, Sooner proposals, with the concern that more dwellings means more families, and more families means more pressure on schools that are already full.

The transport picture adds to that concern. Forest Lake has no train station within its boundaries. The suburb’s main public transport connections to the city are the Route 100 CityXpress from Forest Lake Shops to the city, and the Routes 460 and 461 via the Centenary Highway and Western Freeway. For the More Homes, Sooner framework to designate areas near bus stops as Key Locations eligible for four-storey development, the frequency and reliability of those services matters enormously to residents who would rely on them.

What Is Being Proposed

The changes focus on Low Medium Density Residential LMR zones, typically located near transport corridors and shopping centres rather than across entire suburbs. The proposal would lift the base building height to three storeys across all LMR land. Properties within 400 metres walking distance of a shopping centre or a bus stop with services at least every 20 minutes during the day would qualify as Key Locations and could rise to four storeys on lots of 800 square metres or more.

More Homes, Sooner initiative — *Photo Credit: BCC*

In Forest Lake, only areas close to high-frequency routes would meet that threshold, while streets served by lower-frequency services would remain subject to the three-storey limit.

Minimum lot sizes would reduce to 120 square metres in some circumstances, enabling small freehold houses and terrace-style homes on compact blocks in well-serviced locations. The proposal would adjust on-site car parking requirements, reducing the requirement for two-bedroom units from two spaces to 1.5 spaces citywide and to 1.2 spaces in Key Locations, reflecting declining car ownership and the significant cost car spaces add to new homes.

Design safeguards are part of the framework, including minimum setbacks from freestanding houses, maximum building footprints and requirements for street tree planting.

Affordability: The Real Question

Beyond the infrastructure debate, Forest Lake residents have raised a point that goes to the heart of why the housing crisis persists regardless of what planning rules say. More dwellings do not automatically mean affordable dwellings. Builders and developers face rising costs for labour, materials and financing, along with the tax embedded in every new build, which pushes the price of new townhouses and compact apartments in established suburban Brisbane beyond the reach of many buyers on typical incomes.

Community members have noted that easing planning controls is only one part of the equation, and that without addressing the underlying cost of construction and the viability gap that affects smaller infill projects, the number of homes actually built as a result of these changes may be far fewer than the headline figures suggest. That concern has some grounding in recent history: new dwelling approvals across Brisbane’s LMR zones fell from around 1,100 homes per year to just 445 in 2023, not because the planning rules prevented development, but because the economics of building did not stack up.

Planning-aware residents view the initiative’s adjustment of car parking requirements as one of the more practical levers, noting that a single basement car space can add up to $82,000 to the cost of a unit. Whether that alone is enough to shift the economics meaningfully is a genuine question the community is raising through this consultation.

How to Have Your Say

Consultation on the More Homes, Sooner draft amendments is open until Friday 20 March 2026. Residents can share feedback online at brisbane.qld.gov.au by searching “More Homes, Sooner”, by emailing strategicplanninghousing@brisbane.qld.gov.au, or by calling 07 3403 8888. Written submissions can be posted to Strategic Planning (More Homes Sooner), Brisbane City Council, GPO Box 1434, Brisbane QLD 4001.

Published 26-February-2026.