HOW WE SEE IT! We've gone back, now to the future!

With Bryan Littlely and Shaun Hollis

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Cartoon by SHAUN HOLLIS

I cannot get near to matching Lawrence Mason when it comes to looking back across the 30 years of missed opportunities and what could have been as he did in this week’s Jungle Drum (I doubt there are many who can match him, for that matter) but I reckon I have a reasonable handle on how the next 30 years for Port Douglas, Mossman and the region may play out.

It comes with the territory of covering local politics, even being on local councils in regions not dissimilar to Douglas… where ideas fests and out there concepts abound.

As a Back To The Future tragic - who wanted to call my first bred racehorse Delorean but had to settle for Time Pirate - I figure I also know a thing or two about time travel.

So where will we be in 30 years time?

It seems pretty certain that it will be time for upgrades to the once bustling Teleport at the Port Douglas marina site, to capitalise on the expected rush of adventure tourism the newly announced, and almost certain to become reality, wavepark and swimming lagoon will create for what has been recently labelled a “tired and dying Port”.

A new hi-tech transportation hub is sure to meet with some objection, given the public outrage voiced with the installation of neon hologram signage on Macrossan St to display the new speed limit of 10m/Sec.

They say the new age hovercraft vehicles are only affordable to the elite - or people who can afford to live in Port Douglas - and so repair work on Captain Cook Highway will continue so the region is accessible to all. TMR has advised to take note of road signs, be courteous to Bob the traffic control manager who this week celebrates his 32nd year of night shift on the Range and, Expect Delays.

Diesel price rises are impacting power supply in the Daintree, so there’s been a dusting off of a unique plan for a microgrid. It is being discussed, as is the debate over a bridge or a double ferry crossing of the Daintree River. Residents of the region have been warned not to get their hopes up as “you can’t have everything’’.

Thankfully, some things about the Shire never change There’s no shortage of toads for the cane toad racing at Chilli’s thanks to their wonderful conservation efforts to catch, race and release despite the best efforts of land and pest management authorities to wipe the population out when the sugar cane of the region tragically disappeared 30 years ago.

Mr Personality is still the toughest obstacle on the Port Douglas Golf Course, just a little bigger and a bit slower moving, and dingoes still call Douglas home.

And Mossman Mill remains the jewel in the local tourism industry crown it became three decades earlier when those innovative pot growing hippies - I mean fibre hemp producing visionaries and 2025 purchases of the site - offered over the main building to the preservation of the region’s sugar growing history, the arts and as a gateway to the true last frontier in Australia, Cape York.

Of course, this is just a bit of fun and none of this will ever happen, even if some of it likely should. Dare to dream, but also be happy that the Douglas region is already way out in front of most others in Australia for lifestyle and its people. Don’t change for change sake.

 

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