This open meeting was an opportunity to hear from all of the candidates for the Wynnum/Manly Ward in the upcoming council elections.

The format of the meeting was…

1) A brief introduction to the candidates and the parties they represent
2) Each candidate was then given the opportunity to talk for 5 minutes about what they would do if elected
3) There was also an opportunity for questions from attendees (see below)

The meeting ran in a similar fashion to the Q&A program on ABC TV in that all questions were submitted in advance (and were also be submitted to candidates in advance).

What was interesting is that, when asked (by a show of hands) who was sticking with the candidate they were supporting prior to the forum and who was reconsidering as a result of what they had heard, around a third to a quarter of those present indicated they were reconsidering. Very interesting indeed!

The candidates as pictured in the main image above (in alphabetical order by surname) are Bel Ellis (Greens), Alex Givney (LNP), Craig Moore (Independent) and current councillor Sara Whitmee (Labor).

Questions

Here are all the questions that were asked by attendees (please note those highlighted in grey were not asked due to time limitations, although all candidates received all questions ahead of the meeting).

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There’ll also be a short survey asking you what you think of the changes and what you think is still missing from the retail mix in Wynnum. At the tail end of last year there was some very interesting research that came out on what people in Australia generally want to see in high street and main street retail precincts, and we’ll be sharing some of that with you next time. Until then, enjoy our updates and let us know your thoughts, either in the comments section on the site or on our Facebook page.

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Last year Brisbane City Council launched this program to help tenants and business owners in specific business precincts – like Wynnum Central – to ‘grow and promote a local precinct as a vibrant and attractive destination’.

Council is now inviting businesses in the precinct as well as customers and local residents to have their say and share their thoughts in a short (about 15 minute) survey. You can scan the QR code on the posters and flyers to complete the survey, or simply go to this page on the council website…

https://www.brisbane.qld.gov.au/business-in-brisbane/growing-brisbanes-economy/growing-precincts-together/wynnum-town-centre-precinct

The survey closes on Sunday 17th September.

Here at WynnumCentral we are forever asking you to complete surveys, but we believe it’s important for you to complete this one! As an added incentive council are running a draw where you stand to win one of two $150 prepaid gift cards to spend in the precinct.

Brisbane City Council are already running the program in other Brisbane suburbs – check out information on the one in Rosalie and the one for Racecourse Road.

And don’t forget to tell us what you think of this initiative! PS we’re all for it.

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If you count our ‘birthday’ as the day we published our first article on this site, we’ve well and truly missed it. It was on 20th January 2013. Here’s that article again, in case you didn’t catch it ten years ago…

Wynnum is about to come to life

Whether it did or not, we’ll let you be the judge!

In the interim WynnumCentral has published 1,109 articles about all sorts of things that have been going on in and around Wynnum. Here are the three most popular articles by page views…

1. The Republic of Wynnum welcomes its 4th President (28 July 2020) – 12,460 views
2. Cinema update (9 May 2020) – 12,084 views
3. Wynnum gets a new – Italian – ice cream shop (7 April 2018) – 7,915 views

Our first article only got 833 views!

We’ll be working out how to celebrate our birthday this year – let us know if you have any suggestions!

Main photo: Cup of Couple from Pexels

The post We’re 10 years old this year! appeared first on WynnumCentral.

We’re moving to a weekly news update with at least two stories every week. These will be accompanied by an ENEWS update, with a roundup at the end of the month.

Wider reach

About a year or so ago we asked you whether we should focus on Wynnum Central or go further afield in our reporting, to which you said ‘go further afield’. So that’s what we’re going to do. Not too far though!

More quick polls

We’re interested in what you think! And your responses matter because the relevant people pay attention. So please continue to let us know where you stand and what you’d like to see in our survey and polls. In case you missed it, our poll in the article on Australia Day surprised us with 63% of respondents voicing support for changing the date. We weren’t expecting that result and that’s why these polls are important.

Plus there are a few more changes in the pipeline which we’ll reveal soon!

Classified Ads

Our classified ads section does run one month free ads for certain categories. These are…

• In Memoriam
• Lost/Found
• To Let (for individuals)
• Wanted

And remember – if you have some news you’d like to share with us, jump on this page and let us know, plus if you are running an event, we’d be happy to list it on our What’s On page(which has just been updated with a few events this month and this year).

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Rather than do a full analysis here, here are the screenshots of the results for you to peruse…

As you can see, there is support for WynnumCentral to add a few sections to the site, namely classified ads, a jobs board and property section, the most popular of which was a classifieds section (which would include a jobs section anyway). There is notably less support for ENEWS to publish more than one or two times per month, and the ‘no’s’ have it for a print edition, but only by a narrow margin! So no print edition for the time being.

What is interesting is that there is still support for the community garden project, despite the fact that we have not been able to progress this as quickly as we would have liked. However there is a little movement on this at the moment, hence our question about whether people would want to be actively involved in the community garden. We are actually encouraged that most people (76 people) said ‘maybe’ to this question, with 27 people saying yes and 62 no. That is, in our opinion, a good result.

Thank you also to those people who gave us a little more info in the survey and these comments and suggestions will be incorporated as far as possible in the final plan.

Watch this space.

The post WynnumCentral’s big little ENEWS survey results appeared first on WynnumCentral.

The good news is (drum roll) – the Brisbane City Council’s free wi-fi actually works now. Ever since it was installed many years ago it has never worked (at least the WynnumCentral team has never been able to log on to it) and although we’ve asked the question, we’ve never heard from anybody who’s actually been able to use it successfully. In fact it has been more of a hindrance than a help (see below). Which brings us to the bad news.

The bad news is that – when, back then, the idea of a free wi-fi network in Wynnum was floated (originally by WynnumCentral) – free wi-fi would have been a new, useful thing. It would have enabled smart device users to find out information on the go, plus it would have given the WynnumCentral project valuable information on the popularity of the various events that were hosted in the shopping precinct, like the markets and festivals.

It – unfortunately – ended up being more of a hindrance, because the free wi-fi network was one of the networks ‘remembered’ in our phones and so it would connect automatically, only for there to be no internet connection at all, and we’d end up wondering why apps, the internet etc. weren’t working. The only reason we kept the connection in our phones was on the off chance it might spring back to life!

Well the good news is – it works now. The bad news is, the technology has moved on and people no longer really need a free wifi network. Most people have got 4G enabled devices with generous data allowances and much faster connection speeds using 4G than the Brisbane free wi-fi network can provide. Plus of course it’s more secure to use your own 4G connection.

Moral of the story – technology moves very quickly and what might have seemed a good idea a few years ago probably isn’t any more.

WynnumCentral Editorial Content

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What’s interesting is that there has been no communication to us from Facebook at all (nothing unusual there), but not only that, as administrators of the site we can still see all the posts on the site, so our initial assumption was that we had not been affected. It was only when it was pointed out by a colleague trying to access the site as a regular user that we found out it had been pulled too. Even when looking at the site using the ‘View as visitor’ button, it still seemed fine to us, but no, it’s definitely wiped.

It’s difficult to know how to feel about this – we’re obviously disappointed that we can’t communicate with our Facebook followers but we’re also pleasantly surprised to be lumped in with the bigger players as a ‘news’ site! Presumably this means that when Facebook and Australia make up, we might get another (albeit fairly small) income stream! Well we can live in hope.

So, to all our Facebook people we suggest doing some things the old-fashioned way ie…

• Subscribe to our ENEWS, then it’ll come straight in to your inbox
• Check the WynnumCentral website at wynnumcentral.com.au – all news stories are posted here first
• Sign up for ‘push notifications’ on the WynnumCentral website
• Check us out on Instagram – @wynnumcentral – there is a limit to the number of words you can include in a caption, but at the moment we’re putting up either full or slightly edited versions of our stories on Instagram
• Two other Wynnum-focused Facebook pages are less affected – Wynnum Business and Republic of Wynnum and these pages generally post stories that appear on WynnumCentral (although these now cannot link to news stories on the WynnumCentral site)

Ironically we were recently bemoaning on the Facebook page that we had 4179 followers (the Manly postcode in case you were wondering) and were pleading that someone unfollow us so we could get back to 4178. Someone heard our plea and we’re back down to 4178, but now it’s all a little irrelevant!

One ‘news site’ that has survived the Facebook shutdown is The New Farm News which has recently realised it is now Brisbane’s most popular news page. They’ve got an interesting (and – we think – very funny) take on it – https://www.facebook.com/The-New-Farm-News-101708951314287

There’s also a good analysis of what’s going on in this article on The New Daily – Australians urged to break up with Facebook over news blockade

So, in summary, if you haven’t already, sign up for our ENEWS (in the right hand column on this and every page), check out the other Facebook pages and/or head over to Instagram. Or just one of these would do it. We’d love to hear your comments, thoughts etc and whereas we’d normally head over to Facebook to read them, feel free to leave them in the comments section below.

QUICK UPDATE
Since writing this article the WynnumCentral Facebook page now has some content back up on it, but importantly, no posts which link to news stories on the WynnumCentral website. This also affects the Wynnum Business and Republic of Wynnum Facebook pages. We’re working on it!

The post Banned! appeared first on WynnumCentral.

Now we’re bringing back the eCoin tokens, and we’re going to be giving away $75 worth (ie 15 of them) every month for the next three months (Oct/Nov/Dec) to one lucky ENEWS subscriber. Each eCoin is worth $5 and can be spent like cash in various Wynnum Central retailers.

So far the following businesses are participating in the promo…

• Aalora Florist
• Bare Traps Shoes
• Bay Blends
• Bay Terrace Hair Design
• Cafe Green Bean & Deli
• Cultivate Design Co
• Florence & Cornelius
• Frenchies
• Gigglefit
• Golden Baguette Bakehouse
• Mates Restaurant
• Matildas the Art of Gelato
• Simply Bella
• Sobidah Clothing Co
• Top Katz
• The Coffee Club
• The Wild Fox
• Tingal Graphics (outside Wynnum Central precinct)
• Vietnam Eat Alley
• Vinnies
• With Relish
• Wynnum Fine Jewellers

(retailers in italics are members of Wynnum Business)

And the following are not participating…

• The Collective Store

We have not got around to all retailers yet, so we will keep this list up-to-date as further businesses join the promotion.

So, if you’re not already an ENEWS subscriber, sign up on this site (either via the popup or scroll down the page to where it says ‘Get WynnumCentral ENEWS’ in the right hand column).

The first draw will be at the end of this month. Sign up and …good luck!

BTW if you’re favourite retailer isn’t listed above, ask them to call us and we can explain how it works. You never know, they might join up! The great news for them is that there is no cost to them (the promo is funded by all members of Wynnum Business).

Check out full details here.

The post What are eCoins? appeared first on WynnumCentral.

So, given how often these comparisons are drawn, WynnumCentral decided to do a snaphot survey last weekend of Bulimba, Stones Corner and Wynnum to get a handle on what the real current vacancy rates were in these three suburban shopping strips. The results may (or may not) surprise you.

Firstly it’s important to recognise the limitations of this survey. We focused only on the main retail sections of each strip – in Wynnum this was Edith Street (between Tingal Road and Bay Terrace) and Bay Terrace (between Clara Street and Charlotte Street), in Bulimba it was the section of Oxford Street from the roundabout/service station to Woolworths, and in Stones Corner it was the section of Logan Road between the main Logan Road and Old Cleveland Road.

We only counted shopfronts that fronted on to the main street, not those that were inside alleys or malls or were just doors to businesses based off the street. A vacancy was counted either where a shop had a for lease sign in the window or where it was clearly empty and not trading, including where it was fenced off, whether or not this may have indicated a shop refit or redevelopment.

It’s also important to note the difference in size of these precincts – the section surveyed in Stones Corner is 313m, in Bulimba 533m and in Wynnum 613m – and so with the addition of Florence Street and Tingal Road the area commonly referred to as ‘Wynnum Central’ is significantly larger both in total street length and area than either of the other two precincts.

Based on these approaches, the precinct with the highest vacancy rate was Stones Corner with 20.29% of retail units unoccupied, followed by Wynnum Central with a vacancy rate of 17.95% and Bulimba came in with the lowest at 13.70% – 4.25% lower than Wynnum’s.

What this survey does not do is measure what is being done about these vacancy rates, that is what is the trend – up or down. The good news on this front is that WynnumCentral is aware of a number of new shops (like the one below, scheduled to open next month) and businesses due to set up in the area which could well alter the vacancy rate fairly soon.

Our take is also that we have seen the main exits in early 2020 prompted either by businesses deciding to exit at the end of the year or those deciding to close permanently due to the impact of COVID-19. We think that current businesses are largely here to stay and will be joined by a number of new entrants over the next 6 months or so.

What do you think?

Main image: vacant shop in Stones Corner

See previous articles on empty shops here.

The post Think Wynnum has a high shop vacancy rate? appeared first on WynnumCentral.