Friendly rivalry at State border for tonight’s State of Origin

13 July 2016

Border marker sculpture lights up with blue and maroon

Tonight marks the third game in the 2016 State of Origin rugby league series and to celebrate the occasion, the prominent border marker sculpture at Tweed Heads/Coolangatta has been lit up with blue and maroon lights.

The revamp was the suggestion of Banora Point resident Alan Rolph, who felt the marker was looking a little drab and wrote to his local member, Geoff Provest.

With the cooperation of his Queensland counterpart, Member for Currumbin, Jann Stuckey and Gold Coast and Tweed Shire councils, the border marker is now lit from below with blue and maroon lights, making a striking display as the sun goes down.

Mayor of Tweed, Councillor Katie Milne, said Tweed Shire Council maintains the border marker and the land surrounding it.

“We were happy to be involved in this cross-border collaboration, which highlights our friendship with our Queensland neighbours.” Councillor Milne said.

“It's great to be putting some colour into the NSW/QLD border and at the same time making our lighting more sustainable."

“The border marker is already a tourist attraction and lighting it with the blue and maroon lights in time for State of Origin 3 is going to create more interest and some friendly rivalry.

“In time, we will install environmentally-friendly LED lighting and colour combinations for other special events, such as green and Gold for the Commonwealth Games, red, black and yellow for NAIDOC Week or pink for breast cancer awareness,” she said.

Mr Rolph was at an informal ceremony as the lights turned on for the first time last night and was impressed.

“The idea came to me when I was sitting with friends at Twin Towns Services Club looking at the colour all around at night – except for the border marker, which looked dark and drab,” Mr Rolph said.

“My visitors always love to come down here to take photos – it’s very popular with tourists and will be even more so now.”

The border marker sculpture was erected in 2001 to mark the centenary of Federation.

Downloads

Photo 1(JPG, 96KB)

Caption: Mayor of Tweed, Councillor Katie Milne, Member for Tweed, Geoff Provest, Banora Point resident Alan Rolph, Member for Currumbin, Jann Stuckey and Gold Coast City Councillor for Division 14, Gail O’Neil, at the launch of the border marker lights.

Photo 2(JPG, 68KB)

Caption: The future is bright for the border marker, which will now be lit up at night.