The Spicers Gap Road Conservation Park is a

protected Protection is any measure taken to guard something against damage caused by outside forces. Protection can be provided to physical objects, including organisms, to systems, and to intangible things like civil and political rights. Although ...

conservation park located within the

Main Range National Park The Main Range is a mountain range and national park in Queensland, Australia, located predominantly in Tregony, Queensland, Tregony, Southern Downs Region, southwest of Brisbane. It is part of the World Heritage Site Gondwana Rainforests of Au ...

south east Queensland South East Queensland (SEQ) is a Bioregion, bio-geographical, Megalopolis, metropolitan and Statistics, statistical Regions of Queensland, region of the States and territories of Australia, state of Queensland in Australia, with a population of ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

. The park is part of the Main Range group

World Heritage Site World Heritage Sites are landmarks and areas with legal protection under an treaty, international treaty administered by UNESCO for having cultural, historical, or scientific significance. The sites are judged to contain "cultural and natural ...

Gondwana Rainforests of Australia The Gondwana Rainforests of Australia, formerly known as the Central Eastern Rainforest Reserves, are the most extensive area of subtropical rainforest in the world. Collectively, the rainforests are a World Heritage Site with fifty separate res ...

inscribed in 1986 and added to the

Australian National Heritage List The Australian National Heritage List or National Heritage List (NHL) is a heritage register, a list of National heritage site, national heritage places deemed to be of outstanding heritage significance to Australia, established in 2003. The li ...

in 2007. The park draws its name from

Spicers Gap Spicers Gap is a mountain pass that is located west of Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, and was the original route over the Great Dividing Range in the area around Brisbane. Today it is included in Main Range National Park and is a popular dest ...

, located near .

History

The

Spicers Gap Road Spicers Gap Road is a heritage-listed road at Spicers Gap Road Conservation Park (in the Main Range National Park), Tregony, Queensland, Tregony, Southern Downs Region, Queensland, Australia. It was built from 1859 to 1865. It is also known as ...

is the original route that links the

Darling Downs The Darling Downs is a farming region on the western slopes of the Great Dividing Range in southern Queensland, Australia. The Downs are to the west of South East Queensland and are one of the major regions of Queensland. The name was generally ...

with

Brisbane Brisbane ( ; ) is the List of Australian capital cities, capital and largest city of the States and territories of Australia, state of Queensland and the list of cities in Australia by population, third-most populous city in Australia, with a ...

. It was used by

Cobb and Co Cobb & Co was the name used by several independent Australian coach businesses. The first company to use 'Cobb & Co' was established in 1853 by American Freeman Cobb and his partners. The name grew to great prominence in the late 19th century ...

Coaches and was later replaced by the

Cunninghams Gap Cunningham's Gap is a pass over the Great Dividing Range between the Darling Downs and the Fassifern Valley in Queensland, Australia. The Gap is the major route over the Main Range along the Great Dividing Range, between Warwick and Brisbane. ...

Road named after explorer Allan Cunningham who established the route. The road was constructed by

convict A convict is "a person found guilty of a crime and sentenced by a court" or "a person serving a sentence in prison". Convicts are often also known as "prisoners" or "inmates" or by the slang term "con", while a common label for former convicts ...

s during the 19th century and was listed on the Queensland Heritage Register in 1999. Until the late 1990s, Spicers Gap Road was a popular diversion from the

Cunningham Highway The Cunningham Highway is a National Highway (Australia), national highway located in South East Queensland, south-eastern Queensland, Australia. The highway links the Darling Downs region with the urbanised outskirts of Ipswich, Queensland, I ...

for adventurous off-roaders. It was at times a challenging and rough route, usable only by

4WD A four-wheel drive, also called 4×4 ("four by four") or 4WD, is a two-axled vehicle drivetrain capable of providing torque to all of its wheels simultaneously. It may be full-time or on-demand, and is typically linked via a transfer case provi ...

s and made more difficult by the muddy clay soil that is common to the region. As a result of this increasing popularity, and the carelessness of some users, of the road was closed to vehicles by

Queensland National Parks Queensland is the second-largest state in Australia. As at 2020, it contained more than 1,000 protected areas. In August 2023, it was estimated a total of 14.5 million hectares or 8.38% of Queensland's landmass was protected. List of terrestria ...

and

gazetted A gazette is an official journal, a newspaper of record, or simply a newspaper. In English and French speaking countries, newspaper publishers have applied the name ''Gazette'' since the 17th century; today, numerous weekly and daily newspapers ...

as a conservation park. This is the section at the crest of the gap and was done in order to preserve some of the road's unique 19th century engineering features.

References

Conservation parks of Queensland Great Dividing Range Gondwana Rainforests of Australia South East Queensland Darling Downs Main Range National Park {{SouthernDowns-geo-stub

History

See also

References