Brisbane City Council - indoor sport and recreation

Hi everyone

I'm hoping to purchase a property in a few years time to be used for an indoor sport and recreation centre. This business would only be operating about 25 hours per week, so I intend for it to be leased to other groups at times when I'm not using it. I would be looking for a large space (at least 1,200m2) as I would also require a large carpark to cater for over 40 cars.

I telephoned Brisbane City Council and they confirmed that my activities would be classified as indoor sport and recreation. They suggested that I primarily consider 'mixed use' zones. They also said it might be able to be considered as a 'community facility'.

I had a look at the Brisbane City Council interactive mapping and was surprised to see that there aren't many 'mixed use' zones. This lead me to think, would it be worthwhile to consider purchasing land/property to convert it to a 'community facility'. I would then 'rent' the community facility for my indoor sport and active recreation activities. That is, I would be using two separate legal entities. One for the community facility, and the other for my indoor sport and creation centre. The community facility would also lease the area to other groups when I don't need to use the centre.

I was wondering about this option to see if it would be any easier to secure a property.

Thanks.

 

To set up an "indoor sport and recreation" use, you will need to find appropriately zoned land for this activity. In Brisbane, you are generally limited to the following zones:

Major centre zone
District centre zone
Neighbourhood centre zone
Principal centre zone
Mixed use zone

If you need 1200sqm of GFA and 40 car parking spaces, it is going to be very expensive to find land in the above zones that will meet your needs as these zones are generally used for higher value uses (shops, restaurants etc).

 

Not sure if you would like to purchase land and convert to 'community' zoning. Wouldn't that devalue the land and development potential into the future? Once it is changed, I assume it would be difficult to change back to anything else.

I work for a NFP and we have community facilities and land used for sport and rec. Be careful with BCC. We purchased a sizeable building in a light industrial zone, and had considerable difficulties getting it rezoned for sport and rec (even though there are dance schools and gyms literally a few buildings away). Best we could get was a 'sunset' clause allowing this use for 10 years, and then would be reviewed.