Heritage dental hospital and adjacent Brisbane CBD site released for development

The Queensland government has announced what it calls a "landmark development opportunity" for the private redevelopment of two sites on the northern edge of Brisbane's CBD into a "thriving precinct" ahead of the city's 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

The state-owned land includes a pair of sites totalling 8,900 square metres - a 5,200-square-metre parcel at 200 Turbot Street and the state-heritage-listed Queensland Dental Hospital and College at 168 Turbot Street. The latter, built in the interwar period to a design by Raymond Nowland has been vacant since 2017, and would require restoration and adaptive reuse as part of the proposal.

According to the government's media release, "the new sites [offer] the potential to deliver a place to call home for more Queenslanders, increase hotel bed numbers, or add to Brisbane's stock of office space under a process that will be market-driven."

The government's plan would see the two sites developed with a mixed-use offering, including high-rise housing, education facilities, boutique offices, retail or luxury hotel accommodation.

Previous proposals with similar ambitions to revitalise the site have failed to eventuate. In 2021, a 29-storey office-tower scheme designed by Blight Rayner Architecture was lodged with Brisbane council on behalf of developer Mirvac, who, at the time, held an agreement with the government that allowed the company to hold off on purchasing the site until finding an anchor tenant. The proposal was abandoned by Mirvac in 2024 due to challenging market conditions.

With the announcement of the government's plan to sell the sites, Deputy Premier and Minister for State Development, Infrastructure and Planning Jarrod Bleijie said they are "getting on with the job of driving new development through the activation of land that has set idle for years."

Bleijie described the market release as an "opportunity for CBD revitalisation in Brisbane" and said it would support the creation of "a thriving precinct in the lead-up to the 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games."

The Turbot Street proposition follows Economic Development Queensland (EDQ)'s recent release of a South Brisbane site, currently home to the Visy glass recycling and manufacturing facility, with EDQ aiming to supply more than 4,000 homes. A one-hectare site adjacent to the Queensland Tennis Centre at Yeerongpilly has also been newly released by EDQ for market development into a high-density mixed-use precinct.

Expressions of interest from developers, investors and operators in the Turbot Street sites can be made on the EDQ website until 5 March 2026.