Cairns is a popular place to live and work, and our population will grow even more in the coming decades. Council’s Towards 2050 Shaping Cairns project is planning for this growth now, to make sure everyone can live here and enjoy what we love about Cairns today.

Growth can deliver benefits including more and better jobs, diverse housing options, public spaces, roads and public transport, entertainment, health and education services. Good design and thoughtful planning will help us shape our growth in a positive way, and ensure we can protect and embrace many of the things that make Cairns special: our unique environment, economic, social and cultural values.

The project will be underway from August 2022 to July 2025. During this time, there will be many ways for residents, businesses and community groups to help shape Cairns.

The Towards 2050 growth strategy will shape a prosperous, resilient and sustainable future for the Cairns region by planning for our growth up to 2050.

It will:

• Shape a prosperous, resilient and sustainable future for the Cairns local government area (LGA).
• Promote, protect and enhance our iconic natural environment now and for generations to come.
• Create safe, sustainable and connected places that support a quality life.
• Ensure the community adapts to the inevitable changes in how we live and interact with our places, spaces and environment.
• Provide for a range of housing and employment supported by essential infrastructure, services and facilities that meets the future needs of the Cairns LGA.
• Comprehensively engage with and be informed by the Cairns community.
• Represent best practice, contemporary and progressive planning and growth management in a manner that directly responds to the unique environment, including needs and challenges of the Cairns LGA.
• Provide the foundation and necessary data inputs for Council’s new planning scheme and other growth-related initiatives being delivered by Council.

The project will undertake 12 technical studies:

• Housing
• Centres and employment lands
• Rural lands
• Community infrastructure
• Transport infrastructure
• Neighbourhood character
• Scenic amenity
• Risk assessments:
  • Bushfire
  • Coastal erosion
  • Landslide
  • Stormtide
  • Flood