Public Trails Computed from official land records

Sunshine Coast · Meridan Hill

Meridan Hill from Ridge Track 53

entry is a track 30 m of climb chain confidence Official spatial — evidence class meridan-hill--from-ridge-track-53

Access verdict · Lawful, nothing to flag · weakest evidence in the chain: official spatial record

A lawful approach from Ridge Track 53.

The chain below runs entirely across land the public has an established right to be on. It is a legal line, not a path: nothing here has been surveyed on the ground.

What this verdict means · what the evidence grades mean

On-ground signage and temporary closures override this page. Always.

Getting to the start The trailhead coordinate, not the feature

The start is at -26.79087, 153.03149

That is Ridge Track 53, where the walk below begins — 344 m of it. Every link here goes to that coordinate and never to the feature itself, because a driving route to a waterfall is a driving route into the country above one.

-26.79087, 153.03149

The record does not say what reaches the start The roads layer leaves trafficability unstated on most of its rows, and it is unstated here. That is an absence of evidence, not an ordinary road: treat the last stretch as unresearched.

The coordinate is where the recorded way begins, read off the same layers as the walk. What the record says about a vehicle is above, and it describes this point rather than the drive to it. Whether the road is sealed, gated, or open today, and where a car may lawfully be left, are none of them things these records say — so treat the last few kilometres as unresearched, and the mapping service's route to them as its own work, not ours.

The chain, leg by leg Computed from cadastral geometry; never walked

Legs of the computed corridor, in order, with the grade of the record that made each one lawful
# Runs along Parcel / reference Mapped along it Distance Bearing Evidence
1 Track Main Ridge Fire Management Trail nothing mapped 344.2 m 65.6° ENE Official spatial — evidence class
Total no way mapped 344.2 m Chain confidence Official spatial — evidence class

Every leg above is computed from cadastral geometry. Nobody has walked it, and no part of it is a path on the ground: it is the line along which the public record establishes a right to be. Where a leg names a way, that is what a managing authority has mapped down the same ground — it says nothing more about your right to be there, which the parcel already settled.

Following it on the ground Every step ends at something you can check

under a quarter hour out and back

at least under a quarter hour there at least under a quarter hour back

30 m up and 0 m down on the way out — so the return leg climbs 0 m.

Walking only — nothing is counted for rest, water, photographs, navigation, or the state of the track.

Naismith's rule, and what it does not account for

The way passes this place Official spatial — evidence class

Main Ridge Fire Management Trail passes 38 m from the recorded point. There is 5 m of climb or drop between the two, read at a 5.0 m contour interval. The contours give the height between them and never which way round it is, so this is a separation and not a descent to plan.

The way comes close enough to be a way to this place without the record establishing that it ends at it. A register gives a feature one coordinate and a feature is not a point, so the two measurements above are the whole of the claim: how far off the way passes, and what height separates the two. Nothing here says the last of that gap can be crossed. The walk below runs along the surveyed way and ends on it. Leaving it to close the rest of the gap is not something any record here describes, and this page does not suggest it.

  1. Follow Main Ridge Fire Management Trail for 109 m, setting off ENE (73°), to the junction with Main Ridge Track.

    Back: 253° along Main Ridge Fire Management Trail, 109 m from the start.

  2. Follow Main Ridge Fire Management Trail for 97 m, setting off E (89°), to the junction with Main Ridge Track.

    Back: 269° along Main Ridge Fire Management Trail, 207 m from the start.

  3. Follow Main Ridge Fire Management Trail for 80 m, setting off ENE (63°), to the junction with Main Ridge Track.

    Back: 243° along Main Ridge Fire Management Trail, 287 m from the start.

  4. Follow Main Ridge Fire Management Trail for 57 m, setting off N (4°), to arrive.

    Back: 184° along Main Ridge Fire Management Trail, 344 m from the start.

344 m in total, along the way the managing authority publishes. Every step above ends at something the records let you check on the ground. Bearings are true, not magnetic: they match a phone compass with no conversion. In this part of Queensland a magnetic bezel reads about 11° east of them, so an analogue compass needs that taken off before you set it.

What each step ends at, and why Official spatial — evidence class
junction
A junction with another published way. Unmissable on the ground, and the place a wrong turn happens.
destination
The place itself, which is always where the last step ends.

A cadastral parcel boundary is never one of them. It is invisible on the ground, so a step that ended at one could never be checked — however convenient it looks in the data.

How much climbing Read off the published contour layer

Distance along the route, 0 to 318.9 m · height 105.0 to 135.0 m Read off 5.0 m contours along the route's own line Official spatial — evidence class
Total climb
30.0 m
Total descent
0.0 m
Steepest sustained
17.9% over 55.8 m
Contour interval
5.0 m
Every height the contours record along this route
Contour crossings along the route, in order, as distance along the route against mapped height
Distance along Height
5.9 m 105.0 m
95.7 m 110.0 m
127.2 m 115.0 m
169.7 m 120.0 m
196.0 m 125.0 m
225.5 m 130.0 m
268.7 m 135.0 m
318.9 m 135.0 m

The profile is the height the contour layer already records, read along the same line the legs above describe. It is not a survey of a path: nothing here says the ground between two contours is even, and a layer of 5.0 m contours cannot evidence a step smaller than the gap between them.

The line on the ground

Map

Route map: 1 legs from Ridge Track 53, 344.2 m in total.

Every figure the map would draw — parcel references, distances, bearings and the crossing gap — is written out in full on this page, so nothing is only visible on the map. If the map does not load, nothing has been lost.

What this verdict rests on Grades compose to the weakest link

  • The destination sits on Mooloolah River National Park Official spatial — evidence class

    Parcel 2AP22458, recorded tenure "National Park". Being at the destination and reaching it are separate questions, and this page answers only the second.

    Cadastre and protected-area estate layers Attribution licensed

  • Leg 1: Main Ridge Fire Management Trail carries a right of passage Official spatial — evidence class

    344.2 m at 65.6°. A track recorded by the managing authority in its published access layer, at the vetting status that layer states.

    Leg reference Main Ridge Fire Management Trail Grade official_spatial

If something goes wrong

Emergency reference — read this to 000

Location
Meridan Hill, Mooloolah River National Park
Lot on plan
2AP22458
Coordinates
-26.79000, 153.03445 (WGS84 / GDA2020)
Feature
hill

What this approach was read from