Further concerns regarding prosed development - Phil Dauphin 28.02.2023

b) Watch & Act

Assuming Links Drive or the bridge over Eenie Creek Road have not been compromised, hotel guests
have 30 minutes, from the Watch & Act warning being issued, to leave the area using Links Drive. Ref:
Appendix IV – Emergency Response Plan in the Bushfire Hazard Assessment document dated 10 February 2023,
provided by Rob Friend & Associates.

This assumes that the Emergency Services will be able to issue warnings in good time. Based on the
previous experience in Noosa Springs in 2019, the residents are not confident that this will occur.

A Watch & Act warning should apply to everyone in the eastern district of Noosa Springs (residents in
the three residential communities, golfers and users of the Resort facilities, and guests and visitors to
the hotel). In this scenario, there could be a considerable number of vehicles attempting to use Links
Drive over a short period of time which will greatly increase the risks to the evacuating vehicles and
their occupants.

There is likely to be serious congestion at the Resort Drive/ Links Drive/ Oasis roundabout, and this will
be a real issue for vehicles leaving the Golf & Spa Resort and The Oasis as they will have to give way to
all other traffic using the roundabout.

There is also likely to be worse congestion at the roundabout where Links Drive joins Noosa Springs
Drive where traffic from the western district will have to give way to traffic from the eastern district.
This traffic bottleneck will be compounded by emergency services vehicles entering the bushfire area
at the same time that the other traffic is attempting to exit.

The potential use of the gated access from Noosa Springs Drive onto Eenie Creek Road should be
clarified. In the event of an emergency necessitating evacuation from either or both the eastern and
western districts, it would appear that closing off Eenie Creek Road and opening the 2 gates would
enable the controlled movement of vehicles evacuating onto Eenie Creek Road and enable the swift
movement of emergency vehicles into the area. It would also avoid the work necessary to develop the
access from the Noosa Lions Football Ground for use by emergency vehicles that is suggested in Noosa
Council Infrastructure Services Department Procedure – Emergency Access Noosa Springs (Attachment
A). This could occur whether the bridge over Eenie Creek Road was operational or not.


c) Emergency Warning

When an Emergency Warning is issued, approximately 200 hotel guests and any non-essential hotel
staff, will be evacuated to the Club House, which is the designated Evacuation Centre.

It has been noted that the hotel will be marketing its facilities and services for weddings and other
functions. This may mean that there could be significantly more additional people attending the
function than are staying at the hotel.

Whilst it is not possible to predict numbers, a wedding function held for a local couple could see up to
500 guests present who are not staying at the hotel, in addition to the 200 hotel accommodation
guests.

These numbers will be in addition to golfers, tennis, gym, pool and spa users, any other Golf and Spa
Resort function attendees, possible evacuees from The Fairways residences and from Parkridge
residences and the café/restaurant and gym/pool, and staff. There could be well over 1000 persons
being assembled in the Club House building. The Clubhouse is predominantly situated in the Potential
Impact Buffer Zone and may be subject to smoke and spotting of embers from any fire. This is not
necessarily a safe refuge for this number of people. Fire appliances will need to be stationed around
the building to provide protection and this is not likely. Responsibility rests with the Council, in
conjunction with QFS, to determine the best location to set up an evacuation centre, rather than the
developer.

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