SOUTH-east Queensland must have heavy standard gauge rail to service the region from Maryborough and Toowoomba to the border by 2100.

Now is the time to plan to have the road and rail that will service the future of Queensland and it must be completed by 2100.

The light rail being planned for the Coast is not the answer for the Coast's future. It will fail to provide opportunities for those to come. The council and planner need to look at linking the Gold Coast, Brisbane, and the Fraser Coast with the Sunshine Coast by heavy rail, not in 10 years or even 30 years, but in 50 years. How many of the regions north of Bribie Island to Gympie have residents who are employed in the Greater Brisbane area?

There must be many thousands because the traffic on the Bruce Hwy seems to have increased 10-fold in the past 15 years and is becoming unsustainable. Within a decade it will be worse than the traffic between the Gold Coast and Brisbane and we have no alternative.

If south-east Queensland is to not plunge into a Second or Third World community by 2100, we need planners and implementers of transport services to get onto the job soon.

BOB BUICK,

Mountain Creek