# Townsville's Upper Ross gets $80 million in trunk works for 3,500 homes

A $95 million second-round allocation from the Residential Activation Fund backs water and sewer works in Townsville. The State says the projects open land for about 4,900 homes.

---


Townsville's growth areas are next in line for State money to build the pipes that new estates depend on. A Queensland Government media statement published on Tuesday 18 August 2026 commits $95 million from the second round of the Residential Activation Fund to four projects in the region, and says they will open the way for about 4,900 homes.

More than $80 million of it goes to one package: trunk water and sewer infrastructure in the Upper Ross, which the statement says will serve nearly 3,500 homes.

<div class="keyfacts">
<div><b>$95m</b><span>round 2 funding for the Townsville region</span></div>
<div><b>4,900</b><span>homes the State says the works open up</span></div>
<div><b>$159.7m</b><span>Townsville total across rounds 1 and 2</span></div>
</div>
<p class="src">Source: Queensland Government media statement, 18 August 2026. Home numbers are capacity created by the infrastructure, not dwellings built.</p>

## The projects named in the statement

The statement sets out three lines of funding with the homes each is expected to serve. The first of them, the Upper Ross package, is made up of two separate sewer and water network projects, one to be delivered by Townsville City Council and one by the developer Urbex Pty Ltd. That is how three lines become the four projects of the headline.

<figure class="fig"><figcaption><b>Townsville projects in round 2</b><span>As listed by the Queensland Government</span></figcaption>
<div class="scroll"><table class="tbl">
<thead><tr><th>Project</th><th>Area</th><th>Funding</th><th>Homes</th></tr></thead>
<tbody>
<tr><td>Upper Ross trunk water and sewer package</td><td>Townsville, Upper Ross</td><td>More than $80m</td><td>Nearly 3,500</td></tr>
<tr><td>Mount Margaret reservoir system duplication</td><td>Rangewood and Alice River</td><td>$9m</td><td>730</td></tr>
<tr><td>Mount Low infrastructure</td><td>Northern beaches</td><td>$6m</td><td>Nearly 700</td></tr>
</tbody>
</table></div>
<p class="src">Source: Queensland Government media statement, 18 August 2026. The Upper Ross package contains two projects. The home figures listed add up to about 4,930.</p></figure>

The geography matters. The Upper Ross lies inland, up the river from the city centre, Rangewood and Alice River sit on its western side, and Mount Low is on the northern beaches. The projects are spread across separate growth fronts instead of being concentrated in one.

They also cover different kinds of bottleneck. A reservoir duplication adds storage, which sets how many households a water network can supply at peak demand. Trunk sewer and water mains extend the network's reach. The Mount Low grant is the broadest of the three in its scope: the statement lists water, sewer, electrical, telecommunications and footpath infrastructure. In each case the work has to be finished before a council can approve lots that depend on it.

## What the council asked for

The Upper Ross was Townsville City Council's first choice. In a media release of 15 April 2026, the council said its councillors had voted unanimously to apply to the fund's second round with four projects, ranked in order of priority.

Upper Ross trunk sewer and water infrastructure came first, with about 3,000 residential lots attached to it. Trunk road infrastructure for the Bohle River estates, linked to about 2,000 lots, came second. Lionel Turner Drive, supporting about 835 lots, was third, and the design of trunk water infrastructure for the northern beaches, benefiting about 12,000 lots, was fourth. The council said the applications would together support more than 20,000 homes, and that the Upper Ross and Bohle River packages included co-contributions from developers.

Set against that list, this week's statement funds the council's top priority. The Bohle River, Lionel Turner Drive and northern beaches water design projects do not appear in it. The Mount Margaret reservoir and Mount Low works were not on the council's published list of four, and the statement does not name who applied for them. The fund accepts applications from developers and landowners as well as from councils.

The council's release also set out the pressure behind the applications: the city is expected to gain an additional 50,000 residents over the next two decades. In this week's statement the council is reported as saying it approved more than 1,200 residential lots in the past 12 months, and that housing remains one of the biggest pressures facing the city.

## Townsville in round one

The fund's first round reached Townsville in two announcements that can be traced through Queensland Government statements.

On 8 July 2025 the council's Northern Beaches Trunk Road Infrastructure Package received $29.5 million towards a total cost of $42 million. The works included an additional access from the northern beaches to the Bruce Highway by way of Svensson Road, and congestion relief on Mount Low Parkway. That statement linked 2,600 homes to the package. On 1 September 2025 a further $14.7 million went to a $19.5 million project to signalise the intersection of Weston and Woolcock streets, tied to 1,600 homes at Cosgrove Estate.

Those two grants add up to $44.2 million. This week's statement says Townsville's total across the fund's two rounds reaches $159.7 million. Since $95 million comes from round 2, the earlier round accounts for $64.7 million on the Government's figures. The difference of about $20.5 million is not itemised in the statements reviewed for this article.

Mount Low now appears in both rounds: road access in the first, and services for nearly 700 homes in the second.

## How the grant fits the wider program

The Residential Activation Fund is a $2 billion State program that pays for trunk and essential infrastructure so that housing land can be developed sooner. The round two guidelines published by the State Development department in February 2026 say at least 50 per cent of the money is to be invested outside South East Queensland, and that councils and developers holding a residential development approval can both apply. Projects with a confirmed co-contribution are assessed more favourably.

The guidelines list what the fund pays for: water supply, sewerage, stormwater and transport infrastructure, together with higher-order electrical substations and telecommunications networks. All of the Townsville works fall inside that list. Land acquisition, statutory fees and infrastructure charges, financing costs and maintenance are excluded. Construction projects are assessed on their readiness to deliver, on how well they address housing demand, and on scale of benefit and value for money, a test that includes the cost for each residential lot. On the statement's figures, the Upper Ross package works out at roughly $23,000 of grant for each home it is said to open up, the reservoir duplication at about $12,300 and the Mount Low works at about $8,600.

The guidelines also set deadlines. A funded construction project is to start within 12 months of its announcement and to be completed within three years. For the Townsville projects announced on 18 August 2026, that points to construction under way by August 2027 and finished by August 2029. The statement itself gives no construction dates.

Statewide, the statement puts the capacity opened by the fund at 159,000 homes in less than 18 months. The Government's running figure has climbed through winter as second-round projects have been announced region by region.

<figure class="fig"><figcaption><b>The fund's statewide tally, statement by statement</b><span>Homes "unlocked", as stated by the Queensland Government</span></figcaption>
<div class="scroll"><svg viewBox="0 0 680 242" role="img" aria-label="Bar chart: the stated tally of homes unlocked was 98,000 on 14 June, 100,000 on 12 July, 140,000 on 24 July, 141,000 on 31 July and 159,000 on 18 August 2026.">
<text class="lb" x="176" y="33" text-anchor="end">14 June</text><rect class="bar" x="190" y="14" width="247" height="28" rx="4"/><text class="lb" x="447" y="33">98,000</text>
<text class="lb" x="176" y="79" text-anchor="end">12 July</text><rect class="bar" x="190" y="60" width="252" height="28" rx="4"/><text class="lb" x="452" y="79">100,000</text>
<text class="lb" x="176" y="125" text-anchor="end">24 July</text><rect class="bar" x="190" y="106" width="352" height="28" rx="4"/><text class="lb" x="552" y="125">140,000</text>
<text class="lb" x="176" y="171" text-anchor="end">31 July</text><rect class="bar" x="190" y="152" width="355" height="28" rx="4"/><text class="lb" x="555" y="171">141,000</text>
<text class="lb" x="176" y="217" text-anchor="end">18 August</text><rect class="bar" x="190" y="198" width="400" height="28" rx="4"/><text class="lb" x="600" y="217">159,000</text>
</svg></div>
<p class="src">Source: Queensland Government media statements on the dates shown, 2026. Each figure is a floor ("more than") except the last. The 14 June figure covers round one only.</p></figure>

Between the Bundaberg announcement of 31 July and this one, the stated tally rose by about 18,000 homes of capacity in two and a half weeks. Neither statement itemises the increase, and Townsville's 4,900 is one part of it. The 14 June statement, which doubled the second round from $500 million to $1 billion, said 209 submissions had been received for it, 136 of them from regional, rural and remote areas.

## What it means on the ground

A capacity figure is a ceiling. It counts the homes that could be connected once the pipes, pumps and reservoir are in place. It does not say how many will be built, or when.

Scale offers some perspective. Queensland as a whole had 4,314 dwellings approved in June in trend terms, according to the Queensland Government Statistician's Office summary of Australian Bureau of Statistics data released on 30 July. The 4,900 homes linked to the Townsville works are a little more than one month of approvals for the entire State, to be delivered in a single regional city over a period of years.

The bureau's Building Activity release of 8 July 2026 gives another measure: 10,861 dwellings were commenced across Queensland in the March quarter, in seasonally adjusted terms, and 8,944 were completed.

A local yardstick is the council's own figure. At a little over 1,200 residential lots approved in a year, the capacity announced this week would represent about four years of lot approvals at the city's current pace.

For Townsville residents, the nearer effect is likely to be roadworks and trenching in the Upper Ross and around Mount Low. For buyers, the announcement signals where the city's next estates are expected to be: along the river to the south-west, on the western fringe and up the northern beaches.

The statement also restates the Government's broader housing commitments, including joint Federal and State funding of $2 billion aimed at 51,000 homes, of which 20,000 are intended for first home buyers, the continuing $30,000 First Home Owner Grant, up to 2,000 places in the Boost to Buy shared equity scheme with half reserved for regional Queenslanders, and the target of one million homes by 2044.