Caboolture West is one of South-East Queensland’s largest greenfield growth areas. ‘Caboolture West’ is not a gazetted place name. It is an administrative name that identifies an area designated for future urban growth in the Moreton Bay Regional Council Planning Scheme and other planning documents, including the South East Queensland Regional Plan 2017 (ShapingSEQ).

Over the next 40 years, this semi-rural area about one-hour’s drive north of Brisbane is expected to grow to a city of 70,000 people - comparable in size to the city of Mackay. This emerging community is expected to contain a mixed-use city centre and a range of residential neighbourhoods. It will bring with it a host of business, employment, education and lifestyle opportunities, as well as a diverse range of housing options, and community and recreation experiences.

Council is undertaking planning to manage this growth and support desirable, liveable and sustainable communities.

As development applications were lodged, Council initiated the Caboolture West Place Naming Project, Queensland’s largest local government-initiated collaborative place naming process.

Council wanted naming to happen early in the development process to ensure:

authentic names for suburbs that residents connect with and could proudly call home

unique and meaningful place identities

addressing certainty for postal/delivery and emergency services

protection of existing community identities.

In Queensland, the Department of Resources administers place naming. Council collaborated with the department on the Place Naming Criteria and project methodology to ensure alignment with requirements under the Place Names Act 1994.

Recognising the critical relationship between people and the places they live, work and play, Council implemented a community centric process for the Caboolture West Place Naming Project. Throughout 2021 and early 2022, Council worked with our communities to identify names and define suburb boundaries for the new city coming to Caboolture West.

The Name Your Place community survey was used to collect ideas for names and to better understand community values, preferences and aspirations. In total the community put forward 566 names, of which 160 met Council’s Place Naming Criteria. These 160 names were presented to the Place Naming Committee for short-listing.

The committee was comprised of seven members: the local Councillor, two land developers, a historian, a Traditional Custodian with linguistic expertise, two members of the general public and Council’s CEO (the Committee Chair). It reviewed the name ideas and created a shortlist for Council consideration.

Community input was also an important part of reshaping the existing suburbs to accommodate the new suburbs. Community participants for Suburb Boundary Focus Groups were also selected through an expressions of interest process. The focus groups were held to understand the communities' preferred alignments for new boundaries between existing and new suburbs. Perceptions of community identity and community values were taken into account.

We engaged with the Kabi Kabi First Nation Traditional Owners Native Title Claim Group from the project’s inception. Representatives of the group reviewed the place naming criteria, participated in the Naming Committee, and validated the origin and meaning of names using traditional language.

We kept developers informed and invited representatives of the industry to be part of the Naming Committee alongside community members.

You can read more about the community engagement that was undertaken in the Communication and Engagement Summary Report.

On 16 March 2022, Council resolved to suggest to the State Government the formalisation of the suburb name and boundary changes. On 22 April 2022, we wrote to the State Government suggesting the formalisation of five new suburbs including adjusting the boundaries of four existing suburbs.

When Council submitted the suggested names and boundary changes to the State Government, the statutory place naming process led by the Department of Resources commenced. This included a two-month consultation period that closed on 3 February 2023. The department received 36 submissions on the proposal. In making his decision, the Honourable Scott Stewart MP, Minister for Resources, has considered all the information collated inclusive of consultation submissions. In accordance with the Place Names Act 1994, the decision was published on 14 April 2023 in the Queensland Government Gazette and is effective from that date. This decision formalised the names and boundaries for five new suburbs — Lilywood, Wagtail Grove, Greenstone, Corymbia, and Waraba (city centre) – and altered the existing suburb boundaries of Upper Caboolture, Wamuran, Bellmere and Rocksburg.