Sale may be ‘devalued’ by defects

THE council is refusing to detail what defects consulting engineers found when they investigated structural issues at the Bruce Bishop carpark.

A Gold Coast Bulletin report in August last year revealed council was warned at least two years before a woman was trapped by a falling concrete slab that the carpark was an “infrastructure risk” because its concrete was deteriorating.

The report, at the time, did not suggest concrete cancer contributed to an accident where an Italian tourist sustained spinal injuries, only highlighted ongoing issues at the carpark.

The council last week was sent a series of questions including what consulting engineers had found and whether there were major faults.

The council was asked to confirm whether an X-ray confirmed if reinforcement was used in the block walls.

A council spokesman, in a statement, later replied: “Any report regarding this investigation has been conducted by Legal Services for the purposes of litigation and would be a privileged document.”

Council had set aside more than $1 million for rectification works on the carpark which were to start in 2016-17.

Mayor Tom Tate, on ABC radio yesterday, when asked about the sale of the Surfers Paradise Transit Centre, maintained that any potential buyer would want to keep the carpark and build on the open space above it.

“You know, why would you want to demolish four levels of car parks. You would want to retain all of that,” he said.

But he acknowledged there was no guarantee the carpark would not be demolished and declined to talk about its structural problems. “For me to start talking about maintenance works and things would devalue the property. I wouldn’t want to devalue the property on behalf of people of the Gold Coast,” he said.