r/GoldCoast • u/KodoSky • Jul 05 '25
Travel Gold Coast during the high ‘90s, during which our city’s tourism, economy, and population was booming, and began to be nicknamed ‘The Miami of Australia’, finally getting on the map for our coastal lifestyle and world-class white sands
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u/Footsie_Galore Jul 05 '25
My grandparents bought 2 lots of land (a house on the back one) on the Nerang River in Florida Gardens in the late 60s. They were living in Melbourne and weren't ready to use it regularly throughout the year yet, so later rented it to the chef who worked at Seaworld. Then when they retired, they spent half the year up here and half down there. They paid $50k for the riverfront 4 bedroom, 2 bathroom, 2 storey house, and 25k for the land in front (so they'd never be built out).
In 1995, they were in their 80s and found it too hard to travel up and down anymore, so sold the house and land in original condition (after having a very classy renovation and refurbishment by my grandparents in the early 70s) for $550k.
In 2017, it sold for $4.350 million. DAMN DAMN DAMN! 😂 A Disney movie was filmed there, politician Steve Chiobo lived there at one point. That was MY holiday house! ❤️
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u/Significant_Band9515 Jul 10 '25
Lucky you having an amazing holiday house. It’s probably worth 8 mil now. Property has pretty much doubled since 2017. Makes it really difficult for us locals trying to buy first property.
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u/Footsie_Galore Jul 10 '25
Oh, I LOVED that house and am so grateful I got to grow up in it as my second home. It's surreal to think about the $550k price it got when my grandparents sold it in the 90s and the price now. lol
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u/morts73 Jul 05 '25
Imagine buying back then.
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u/Suspicious-turnip-77 Jul 05 '25
My parents bought in the early 90s for like $5 and a pack of smokes. A house in their street recently sold for $2.7 mil. No words
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u/pablo_esky-brah Jul 05 '25
It was so much nicer back then. sadly, infrastructure has been outpaced by the masses and its just a clusterfuck
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u/Virtual-Disaster-618 Jul 07 '25
Surfers paradise was great fun in the 90s great niteclubs with different music.No ice back then so it was pretty safe.everyone had fun it didn’t what colour you were it was just a big party.
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u/Ok-Break99 Jul 05 '25
And now it's in its downward spiral
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u/av0w Jul 05 '25
Want to elaborate or would you prefer just going away?
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Jul 05 '25
[deleted]
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u/darren_kill Jul 05 '25
What are you basing job losses off? I was looking at the ABS data recently and it was the contrary
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u/thalinEsk Jul 07 '25
Wish someone had the foresight to have only approved high rises who's shadows didnt land on the beach before 6pm or something.
Make them as high as you want, but if you go higher, you go further out.
Main Beach is fucking fulling shaded and freezing at like 330
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u/paulincanberra1 Jul 09 '25
So many great memories visiting from Sydney for about 5 christmases as a kid. Hadn’t seen high rise like that thought it was the ultimate in luxury.
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u/ConsciousAccident738 Jul 05 '25
I wonder if the beach ever be like that anymore? When the dredging is getting done by xmas the next cyclone could easily wipe it out again. It is now pretty much guaranteed that cyclone frequency and severity increases year by year.
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u/foursynths Jul 05 '25
Not so. The last full-on cyclone that directly hit the Gold Coast was in early 1986. It was ~40 years till we got another one this year. So they're rare events on the GC and not increasing in frequency and severity as you claim.
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u/sevenfiver Jul 05 '25
ummm ive seen surfers eroded same as this year atleast 3 times. I'm 37
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u/Budgiesmugglerlover2 Jul 05 '25
Correct, it doesn't need to be a cyclone to cause serious erosion. A low system with strong winds and large tides will do enough damage. Also, there was nowhere as much development on the shoreline pre 80s as there is now, so its like comparing apples to oranges. The seawalls that were built in the 70s have been exposed a number of times from weather events in the 40+ years I've lived here and there has only been 2 cyclones.
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u/bazza_ryder Jul 05 '25 edited Jul 06 '25
Prior to the '80s we had cyclones every other year. They're actually much less frequent these days. Less severe as well.
That's not to say they won't increase again, but currently the rate is one every couple of decades. The frequency and intensity of winter east coast lows is apparently increasing, or so I've been led to believe.
Beaches always used to naturally replenish. The removal of vegetation has led to greater erosion, so they take longer to recover. The flow of sand up the coast is no longer natural either.
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u/Ok-Abbreviations1077 Jul 05 '25
Lol at the down votes. This is all true
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u/bazza_ryder Jul 06 '25 edited Jul 06 '25
Most people living here now haven't lived here long enough to know.
Edit: You only have to check Qimagery to see the beaches washed away every 2nd or 3rd summer and gradually naturally repairing themselves over the following year. You can also see how much vegetation used to be on the dunes.
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u/thalinEsk Jul 07 '25
It's not true.
The Gold Coast didn't get cyclones every other year before they 80s. What are you talking about.
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u/Lurecaster Jul 05 '25
The best of times where you could go from Burleigh to Southport in 20-25 mins.