Do people from Noosa and Gold Coast want to be with the rest of us? Google says no
There’s something odd happening on the Gold Coast and Noosa.
Noosa and Gold Coast residents have decided to sit out the pandemic
According to Google mobility data, the people of both regions appear to riding out the pandemic “under the doona” as Prime Minsister Scott Morrison aptly described it.
As scary as it seems, Google can track a population via the apps on your phone, disseminate the data and tell you what the population of that city, state or country is or isn’t doing.
Overall, when compared with the first five-week period of the year (which was pre-pandemic) Queenslanders have sworn off public transport (down 34 per cent), decided not to go to the office (down 9 per cent), stayed at home (up 4 per cent), begged off shopping (down 6 per cent) and overwhelmingly decided to go to the beach or park (up 34 per cent).
But at Noosa and the Gold Coast, they’ve done nothing except stay home. Even beach and park visits were down. It’s understandable they wouldn’t catch public transport there because, well, have you ever heard of someone from Noosa on a bus? With the public?
But the people of both centres, which are defined by their beaches, haven’t gone to the beach when just about everyone else in Queensland is doing exactly that. The only activity in which both regions had an increase was residences.
That may be the answer. They just don’t want to be with the rest of us.
The people of Ipswich, though … They are totally on board with the beach and park thing (up 45 per cent). As were Gladstone (up 44 per cent) and Mackay (up 63 per cent) residents.
The people of Noosa said no to retail therapy (down 10 per cent), definitely no to supermarkets and pharmacies (down 20 per cent), never to beaches and parks (down 20 per cent), “are you nuts” to public transport (down 34 per cent), no to work (but who works? down 6 per cent) but yes, oh god yes, to home (up 3 per cent).
Maybe the whole Sails Restaurant COVID cluster got to them.
You can see through the figures that there is a difference between Noosa and the rest of the Sunshine Coast where there was an 18 per cent increase in getting out and about to beaches and parks.
Bundaberg appears to be the only city that wants everything. It was up across the board.
If you wondered why the Brisbane CBD was looking empty, the number of people going to their workplace is down 19 per cent and public transport is down 43 per cent.
