30/04/2026
3.4
Local tourism planning, including local government
planning schemes
Local tourism plans
Tourism planning at the local scale provides
critical local context. Queensland councils
alongside local tourism groups sometimes
prepare tourism plans for their local
government area and sometimes for smaller
areas or for special tourism features and
assets.
Other local government plans—particularly
economic development strategies—provide
an excellent opportunity to state tourism
goals alongside broader policy objectives.
Local government planning schemes are
another essential channel for tourism
planning and these are addressed separately
in the section below.
Like most planning processes, local tourism
plans are best developed in collaboration
between government, industry and
community. Different departments within a
council must be engaged, including those
responsible for land use planning. Linking
tourism strategies to corporate and capital
works plans provides a potential means
for funding and implementing tourism
supportive projects.
Local government planning schemes
Local government planning schemes are
probably the most important level of statutory
planning in Queensland. They express
planning policy that integrates state, regional
and local intentions, and include most of the
planning regulations that development is
assessed against.
According to the Tourism Research Australia,
9 in 10 tourism businesses in Queensland are
classified as small businesses. It is important
for local governments to understand the
influence and potential impacts their planning
schemes can have on the operation these
small scale tourism activities, as well as
the larger scale one. As with other forms of
development, local government planning
schemes have the ability to enable tourism
development by encouraging tourism in
their strategic frameworks and in a range
of zones and, tailoring the requirement for
approvals and assessment benchmarks, as
well as fees and charges in a way that are
clear, achievable and realistic for tourism
development.
Planning schemes can facilitate sustainable
tourism development in three key ways:
Planning schemes can facilitate sustainable
tourism development in three key ways:
1. They can be flexible and risk tolerant
to respond to the market and cater to
the needs of the tourist by providing for
tourism development—accommodation
types, attractions, support facilities,
infrastructure and other supporting
services.
2. They can recognise, protect and enhance
the setting, character, sense of place,
identity and key features, assets and
values that make a place or destination
attractive for tourism.
3. They can encourage and make it easier
for sustainable tourism development
to happen, including influencing
development costs and providing
flexibility in the planning scheme.
The Queensland Government’s clear
direction is for planning schemes to support
appropriate and sustainable tourism
development opportunities, and to protect
the social, cultural and natural values
underpinning tourism.
