Brisbane

The Gift

Brisbane is the capital and most populous city in the Australian state of Queensland and the third most populous city in Australia. Brisbane's metropolitan area has an approximate population of 2 million. A resident of Brisbane is commonly known as a "Brisbanite".

The Brisbane central business district stands on the original settlement and is situated inside a bend of the Brisbane River approximately 23 kilometres from its mouth at Moreton Bay. The metropolitan area extends in all directions along the floodplain of the Brisbane River valley between the bay and the Great Dividing Range. While the city is governed by several municipalities, they are centred around the Brisbane City Council which has jurisdiction over the largest area and population in metropolitan Brisbane and is also Australia's largest Local Government Area by population.

Brisbane is named after the river on which it sits which, in turn, was named after Sir Thomas Brisbane, the Governor of New South Wales from 1821 to 1825. The first European settlement in Queensland was a penal colony at Redcliffe, 28 kilometres (17 mi) north of the Brisbane central business district, in 1824. That settlement was soon abandoned and moved to North Quay in 1825. Free settlers were permitted from 1842. Brisbane was chosen as the capital when Queensland was proclaimed a separate colony from New South Wales in 1859.

The city played a central role in the Allied campaign during World War II as the South West Pacific headquarters for General Douglas MacArthur. Brisbane has hosted many large cultural and sporting events including the 1982 Commonwealth Games, World Expo '88 and the final Goodwill Games in 2001. In 2008, Brisbane was classified as a gamma world city+ in the World Cities Study Group’s inventory by Loughborough University. It was also rated the 16th most livable city in the world in 2009 by The Economist.

Brisbane is in the southeast corner of Queensland, Australia. The city is centred along the Brisbane River, and its eastern suburbs line the shores of Moreton Bay. The greater Brisbane region is on the coastal plain east of the Great Dividing Range. Brisbane's metropolitan area sprawls along the Moreton Bay floodplain from Caboolture in the north to Beenleigh in the south, and across to Ipswich in the south west.

The city of Brisbane is hilly. The urban area, including the central business district, are partially elevated by spurs of the Herbert Taylor Range, such as the summit of Mount Coot-tha, reaching up to 300 metres (980 ft) and the smaller Enoggera Hill. Other prominent rises in Brisbane are Mount Gravatt and nearby Toohey Mountain. Mount Petrie at 170 metres (560 ft) and the lower rises of Highgate Hill, Mount Ommaney, Stephens Mountain and Whites Hill are dotted across the city.

The city is on a low-lying floodplain. Many suburban creeks criss-cross the city, increasing the risk of flooding. The city has suffered two major floods since colonisation, in 1893 and 1974. The 1974 Brisbane flood occurred partly as a result of "Cyclone Wanda". Heavy rain had fallen continuously for three weeks before the Australia Day weekend flood (26 – 27 January 1974). The flood damaged many parts of the city, especially the suburbs of Oxley, Bulimba, Rocklea, Coorparoo, Toowong and New Farm. The City Botanic gardens were inundated, leading to a new colony of mangroves forming in the City Reach of the Brisbane River.

Brisbane has a humid subtropical climate (Köppen climate classification Cfa) with warm to hot and humid summers and dry, moderately warm winters. From November to March, thunderstorms are common over Brisbane, with the more severe events accompanied by large damaging hail stones, torrential rain and destructive winds.

The city's highest recorded temperature was 43.2 °C (110 °F) on 26 January 1940. On 19 July 2007, Brisbane's temperature fell below the freezing point for the first time since records began, registering −0.1 °C (31.8 °F) at the airport. In 2009 Brisbane recorded its hottest winter day at 35.4 °C (95.7 °F) on August 24. 

Brisbane's wettest day was 21 January 1887, when 465 millimetres (18.3 in) of rain fell on the city, the highest maximum daily rainfall of Australia's capital cities. Recent floods are set to surpass that of the 1974 floods which caused catastrophic damage.

From 2001 until 2008, Brisbane and surrounding temperate areas had been experiencing the most severe drought in over a century, with dam levels dropping to 16.9% of their capacity on August 10, 2007. Residents were mandated by local laws to observe level 6 water restrictions on gardening and other outdoor water usage. Per capita water usage is below 140 litres per day, giving Brisbane one of the lowest per capita usages of water of any Western city in the world. A reversal of fortune in early 2008 has seen Brisbane's water storage climb to over 98% of maximum capacity. Water restrictions have been replaced with water conservation measures that aim at a target of 200 litres per day/per person, but consumption is rarely over 160 litres.

Dust storms in Brisbane are extremely rare; on 23 September 2009, however, a severe dust storm blanketed Brisbane, as well as other parts of eastern Australia.

Brisbane also lies in the Tropical Cyclone risk area. Although cyclones hitting Brisbane are rare, they have happened in the past. The last cyclone to affect Brisbane but not directly cross the city was Tropical Cyclone Hamish in March 2009, although the cyclone remained approx 350 km (220 mi) north of Brisbane but caused significant damage to beaches and caused the worst oil spill in Moreton Bay