Years of work pay off
THE Cairns Aquarium has won a major infrastructure award for its energy efficient design.
The tourism business, built by FK Gardner & Sons, won the Master Builders Queensland award for Project of the Year, as well as for Leisure Facilities over $10 million.
Cairns Aquarium chief executive and founder Daniel Leipnik said it was an honour to be recognised.
“We were already very excited when we won the regional North Queensland Master Builder Award for project of the year, but to hear that a tourism and leisure project from Far North Queensland is considered the best out of the state is amazing,” he said.
Mr Leipnik said the award proved to the team that the years of hard work were worth it.
“This building took six years of engineering and construction,” he said.
“This building is like an onion with lots of layers. The outside is a big, white box. Interestingly, I think that’s what won it. A lot of thought has gone into the layers.
“The next layer is the visitor journey, and the next layer is the technical platform.”
Mr Leipnik said aquariums were typically built on or next to major water channels, however the location of the Cairns Aquarium meant technology had to be created to pump mass amounts of water in every day.
“We have a terminology that we use, called the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park simulator, and that describes the systems that are controlling the fresh, brackish and salt water throughout the aquarium,” he said.
“We feel that the judges have recognised these complex systems in their judging.”
But more than that, Mr Leipnik said he felt the judges had also shone a spotlight on Cairns’ tourism industry.
“It’s very unusual for tourism and leisure to win a competition like this,” he said.
Master Builders chief executive Grant Galvin said being awarded one of the Master Builders Queensland awards was a highly soughtafter honour.