Brisbane City Council has selected the final locations of two West End green bridges linking West End to Toowong and St Lucia.

Brisbane amateur historian Magnus Eriksson has set out to walk and kayak the entire length of the Brisbane River while filming the experience for Youtube after researching the idea when stuck in lockdown last year. Mr Ekriksson and his co-walkers will walk a day a month stopping along the way to speak to locals and hear their stories. The group say there is no timeline and the enjoyment and personal fascination is the driver. Each Youtube video is around thirty minutes detailing the places and people along the way.

Brisbane City Council is consulting with the state government as it looks to crack down on unsightly and obstructive advertising around Brisbane. The proposed changes to the Advertising Devices Local Law come as a result of significant concern around Brisbane regarding advertising which hinders pedestrians and vehicles. Several committee submissions regarding the issue suggest an overall reduction in the amount of advertising in Brisbane should also be considered.

Despite repeated warnings from the national regulator and health authorities, popular plastic water beads toys remain on sale across Australia even though they can cause fatal blockages in a child’s intestines. The brightly coloured polymer balls sold in major retailers across Australia are often sold in packets of thousands and expand more than 100 times their original size when wet. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission raised warnings as far back as 2015 saying although the toy was marketed to children above the age of five, younger children are likely to be attracted to the

Joel Greenberg, a Florida politician and friend of embattled pro-Trump congressman Matt Gaetz, has plead guilty to 6 counts of child sex trafficking in an Orlando court. Greenberg was originally facing thirty three charges but reportedly accepted a plea deal in which he agreed to cooperate fully with other investigations. Congressman Gaetz is the subject of a federal probe into his own involvement in the alleged child sex trafficking ring and related abuse-of-power allegations, with Greenberg’s lawyer saying, quote, “I am sure Matt Gaetz is not feeling very comfortable today.”

Turkish mafia boss Sedat Peker is causing unease at the highest levels of the Turkish government as he uses lockdown to post weekly videos to YouTube about his close relationship to members of the ruling AKP party. Peker’s weekly videos have amassed a large viewership in Turkey as he tells stories of the AKP party’s close ties to organised crime, name-dropping the likes of Interior Minister Suleyman Solyu and former finance minister Berat Albayrak, who is also President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s son-in-law. Sedat Peker has previously served prison terms for fraud, murder and organised crime in

Brisbane woman Stephanie Simmons who was held hostage along with her colleagues in 2016 is now using the experience to empower other women. Ms Simmons says she felt helpless and terrified during the siege which led her to take up martial arts. Ms Simmons is now an instructor and says martial arts has given her confidence. A free self defence class for women was held over the weekend at the Mattfides-Martial Arts Club on the Sunshine Coast which she helped run along with club owner Ryan Canavan.

Petroleum firm Ampol says it retains the right to pursue the conversion of its Lytton oil refinery near Brisbane into an import terminal despite accepting a $108 million a year federal government subsidy to remain open as a refinery. Ampol says it wishes to keep its options open in case of failure to legislate the subsidy or continued poor returns after the Lytton refinery posted a $145 million loss for 2020. The taxpayer funded grant to the Ampol Lytton refinery and the Viva refinery in Geelong is part of the federal government’s efforts to keep Australia’s two remaining domestic refinerie

Former Australian champion swimmer Brenton Rickard has been reunited with 60 of his medals that were stolen from his Gold Coast home last year. Antique dealer from Dalby, Christie Warby messaged Mr Rickard after she purchased some of his medals during an online auction earlier this month. Ms Warby, also a former swimmer, was planning to make a good profit from the medals before learning they were stolen. She immediately reached out to Mr Rickard who said it was a huge relief.