Queensland passes legislation for Olympic Games venues<\/a><\/p>\nThe move will exempt Games infrastructure from major planning laws, in a bid to ensure projects are not held up by potential legal challenges.<\/p>\n
The first tranche of works \u2013 an upgrade to two stands at the venue \u00a0\u2013 will begin next week once this year’s show wraps up.<\/p>\n
Construction on Machinery Hill, where the new arena will be built, will begin after the 2026 Ekka.<\/p>\n
It will mean a temporary stand for at least the 2027 Ekka as that arena will take more than a year to build, the RNA’s CEO Brendan Christou said.<\/p>\n
Mr Crisafulli would not confirm what year construction on the village itself would begin, saying only it would be ready by 2032.<\/p>\n
“It’s got to be ready by 2032,” he said.![\"An](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/e7c3698315eb300e2b6f7038df081891\")
<\/p>\n
An athletes’ village will be built at the RNA showgrounds in Brisbane for the 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games.\u00a0 (Supplied)<\/p>\n
The government would also not outline how much the development at the RNA showgrounds would cost, with Deputy Premier Jarrod Bleijie citing the arrangements as “commercial contractual negotiations”.<\/p>\n
They were also unable to say how much of a 2,000-unit athletes’ village, which will house up to 10,000 athletes during the games, would be dedicated to social and affordable housing following the event.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Mr Bleijie said the government was working with the private sector and the RNA to work out what the split would be, saying it needed to “stack up” financially.<\/p>\n
![\"people](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/d3015d8366bd997961fb95ad8a9ceaaa\")
<\/p>\n
The Ekka is held annually in Brisbane.\u00a0 (ABC News)<\/p>\n
Ekka won’t be interrupted until 2032<\/p>\n
Mr Christou welcomed the upgrades as a “win for regional Queensland”.<\/p>\n
He said it was important the Ekka would be able to continue to run uninterrupted until 2032.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“The Ekka is about celebrating agriculture and showcasing the best of Queensland, and we need to be able to keep doing that as we develop around us,” he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Mr Christou has foreshadowed “some compromises” in the years to come but he said the almost 150-year-old Ekka needed to continue to evolve.<\/p>\n
![\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/7f0a875df8f040aa0024f3b0f2765549\")
<\/p>\n
Upgrades to the Brisbane Showgrounds will begin next week. (ABC News)<\/p>\n
The upgrades to the John MacDonald and Ernest Baynes stands are also expected to improve accessibility as well as give them a “facelift”, Mr Christou said.<\/p>\n
The RNA won’t be funding any of the upgrades at the showgrounds, Mr Christou said, but it would weather a cost to its business throughout the construction.<\/p>\n
Some other events held at the showgrounds throughout the year would need to be adjusted or moved, he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Mr Christou has said some Ekka events may be held in 2032 in regional areas, but it wasn’t yet clear what that would look like.<\/p>\n
‘Would have been nice to open it up’![\"a](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/c2247fb38a48de5c6197adefe1287184\")
<\/p>\n
Lou Davidson attended the Ekka on Monday. (ABC News)<\/p>\n
Lou Davidson, who attended the Ekka on Monday, said it was a “bit of a shame” the event wouldn’t be held as usual in 2032.<\/p>\n
“It would have been nice to open it up to the world,” she said.<\/p>\n
“But I guess they’re going to use it for something else.”<\/p>\n
Ms Davidson said she didn’t believe the stands needed upgrading as they had a “nice feel” to them already.<\/p>\n
But she said she understood the venue needed upgrading and modernising.<\/p>\n
“It would have been nice to leave it as is.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Queensland government has promised there will be no disruptions to the Ekka until 2032, ahead of upgrades…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":60768,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49263,49265,11758,32445,49262,49258,43,4217,49264,49260,49261,44,10018,4113,94,701,49259,49266,41,39,42,40,9536],"class_list":["post-60767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-brendan-christou","tag-brisbane-2032-olympic-games","tag-construction","tag-costs","tag-deputy-premier-jarrod-bleijie","tag-ekka","tag-headlines","tag-infrastructure","tag-lnp","tag-machinery","tag-machinery-hill","tag-news","tag-olympics","tag-premier-david-crisafulli","tag-qld","tag-queensland","tag-royal-queensland-show","tag-social-and-affordable-housing","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-upgrades"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60767","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=60767"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60767\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/60768"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}