Toowoomba sits on the crest of the Great Dividing Range, and a shed here has to cope with Range weather, city lots on one side of town and acreage on the other.
Building a shed in Toowoomba
East Creek and West Creek run through the city, and after the January 2011 flash flood Council's Gowrie Creek flood study found East Creek road crossings flood with a 10 to 20% or greater chance each year. Council later finished $25 million of detention basins and channel works. For a shed, the practical step is Council's flood risk portal: look up the lot's flood risk level before choosing where the slab goes.
Where the flood overlay applies, Toowoomba's planning scheme sets floor levels above the defined flood event (300 mm in FR1 areas, 500 mm in FR2 to FR4). A Class 10 shed is treated differently from a house, so we confirm with the certifier what applies to your building.
At around 640 to 690 m elevation, Toowoomba is cooler and often windier than the coast. Open-bay sheds on the western and northern edges of the city face long exposed fetches, which the engineer accounts for in the site wind speed.
