| Logan River | |
|---|---|
Jimboomba, 2011 |
|
| Origin | Scenic Rim |
| Mouth | Moreton Bay |
| Basin countries | Australia |
| Basin area | 3,740 km² [1] |
The Logan River is a river in South East Queensland. The catchment is dominated by urban and agricultural land use. Near the river mouth are mangrove forests and a number of aquaculture farms.[2]
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The Logan was discovered in August 1826 by Captain Patrick Logan. Logan initially named the river the Darling River, but to avoid confusion, Governor Ralph Darling ordered the name be changed to honour its discoverer.[3]
A toll bridge on the river north of Beenleigh was collecting money by the late 1930's as weekend traffic between Brisbane and the Gold Coast increased.[4]
The flooding in the lower reaches of the river were the worst for the 20th century during the 1974 Brisbane flood.[5]
The river begins in the Mount Barney National Park, near the New South Wales border between Mount Lindesay and Mount Ernest, before heading north, east, and eventually flowing into Moreton Bay. The Mount Lindesay Highway crosses the river via Macleans Bridge.
Its principal tributaries are the Albert River which joins it just east of Beenleigh, Teviot Brook which begins at Mount Superbus and joins the Logan River at Cedar Pocket and Burnett Creek which is subverted by the Maroon Dam west of Rathdowney.
Maroon Dam subverts Burnnett Creek, and supplies water to the Beaudesert Shire. Maroon is managed by SunWater and covers approximately 106 km². Several projects are underway, to supply water to the Queensland government's Southern Regional Pipeline. The Bromelton off-stream storage facility is currently under construction on the Logan River, outside Beaudesert, as is the Cedar Grove Weir, near Jimboomba.
On July 4, 2006, the Queensland Government decided against the construction of a Logan River dam at Tilley's Bridge in Rathdowney, due to mounting public pressure and high road diversion costs. Instead, the Wyaralong Dam was proposed on Teviot Brook near Boonah, which will inundate 15 properties instead of the 100 for the Tilley's Bridge site.
The Tilley's Bridge dam, if it had been approved, would have inundated the area of land between Tilley's Bridge, just to the south of Rathdowney, and Bigriggan Camping Reserve, some eight kilometres west, covering a significant section of the Boonah-Rathdowney Road.
The river water is very turbid.[2] The annual Healthy Waterways Report Card for the waterways and catchments of South East Queensland rated the condition of the Logan River as very poor.[6] Much of the environmental degradation has been caused by land clearing, the Bromelton industrial estate,[7] nutrient run-off and the pumping of wastewater directly from several wastewater treatment plants in and around the Logan River.[8] In 2009, the Queensland Government's "Healthy Waterways EcosystemHealth Monitoring Program" rated the River's freshwater area at a "D"; its Estuarine area was given an "F".[9]
Community projects exist in the Logan catchment area to clean up enhance the quality of the ecosystem. Competitions such as Carp-busters are aimed at reducing the number of carp, and therefore allow native species of fish a better chance of survival.