SOUTH WEST QUEENSLAND
RAISE A GLASS TO COUNCIL ENGINEERS
Luke Tanner, Manager Works, Goondiwindi Regional Council
Andrew Leach, Coordinator Development Services / EA Engineering, Goondiwindi Regional Council
Dion Jones, Director Engineering Services, Goondiwindi Regional Council
The Queensland regional centre of Goondiwindi is protected by a levee bank, now stretching to approximately 21km, which has protected the town since the late 1950’s. In 2021 the bank again protected its community from widespread flooding a number of times including two occasions where the Macintyre river reached levels within 240mm of the record 2011 flood.
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Bill McNulty - Foreman
Vernon Redmond - Engineer
The Goondiwindi Region is a local government area located in the Darling Downs of southeast Queensland. The region encompasses townships from Texas in the east, through Inglewood, Yelarbon, Goondiwindi, Toobeah and Talwood to the west, including many more small rural communities in between. The region’s main town centre, Goondiwindi, is situated 350 kilometres west of Brisbane and sits proudly on the banks of the Macintyre River, which delineates the Queensland / New South Wales border.
floodplains upstream of Mungindi, then turning southwest back into New South Wales.
The Macintyre River forms part of the Border Rivers catchment and is one of the northern-most catchments in the Murray – Darling Basin. It begins on the western slopes of the Great Dividing Range in Northern New South Wales before the Dumaresq River and Macintyre Brook join into it just upstream of Goondiwindi and it continues running westward, gradually merging with other streams to become the Barwon River on the
Water – a blessing and a burden The ‘Gundi Windi Pastoral Company’ was established in the 1840s on the banks of the Macintyre River, where the Goondiwindi township now sits, for its rich and fertile farming soil. Goondiwindi is now a major centre for agriculture, producing a range of crops and fibres, and is an integral point of convergence of five major highways servicing Queensland and the southern states. Save for times of exceptionally harsh drought, the access to such an abundance of water has long been a blessing and a burden for Goondiwindi. Since its establishment in the 1840s, the town has experienced a series of major floods including in 1890, 1921, 1950, 1953, 1954, 1955 and again in 1956, when the river rose over 10 metres, causing major damage in the town and district on four occasions in January and
ENGINEERING FOR PUBLIC WORKS | MARCH 2022
