The Headland https://theheadland.au/ News for the Mid North Coast of NSW: Port Macquarie, Coffs Harbour, Kempsey, Nambucca Valley and Bellingen. The Headland reads the region's council business papers, flood-recovery program pages, project updates, crop data and datasets end to end, cites what it reads, and reports what it means. en Coffs Harbour earns the most from each visitor on the mid north coast, and it is not because they spend more per day https://theheadland.au/community/visitor-economy-three-lgas/ https://theheadland.au/community/visitor-economy-three-lgas/ Fri, 28 Aug 2026 19:29:17 GMT TRA's LGA profiles put spend per trip at $578 in Coffs Harbour, $487 in Port Macquarie-Hastings and $383 in Mid-Coast, but Coffs earns less per night than Port Macquarie. Two-year average, 2023 to 2024. Port Macquarie's $265 million hospital upgrade is the biggest since 1994. Its own project page still reads Planning, and gives no date https://theheadland.au/health/port-macquarie-base-hospital-265-million-upgrade/ https://theheadland.au/health/port-macquarie-base-hospital-265-million-upgrade/ Fri, 28 Aug 2026 02:27:18 GMT Health Infrastructure's page for the Port Macquarie Base Hospital Redevelopment records $265 million committed, a four-storey inpatient building, an expanded emergency department and new maternity and neonatal units. It also records the status as Planning, says the project is in the design stage, and names no construction start and no completion date. Eighteen months after the project manager and architect were appointed, that is what the official source tells a resident. Coffs Harbour airport has more flights than before COVID and 37 per cent fewer passengers https://theheadland.au/transport-bypass/airport-passengers-per-flight/ https://theheadland.au/transport-bypass/airport-passengers-per-flight/ Tue, 25 Aug 2026 03:45:00 GMT BITRE airport traffic data to 2024-25 shows Coffs Harbour recorded 250,298 passenger movements, 36.9 per cent below its 2018-19 figure, while aircraft movements were 3.3 per cent above it. Average passengers per aircraft movement fell from 69.3 to 42.3. Port Macquarie shows the same shape with 9.4 per cent more aircraft movements, 11.4 per cent fewer passengers, and a fall of 16.3 per cent in the single year to 2024-25. What the Pacific Highway upgrade did to the towns it went around https://theheadland.au/transport-bypass/pacific-highway-upgrade-explained/ https://theheadland.au/transport-bypass/pacific-highway-upgrade-explained/ Sun, 23 Aug 2026 17:47:00 GMT An explainer on the Pacific Highway upgrade read from the programme's own site: that it is the largest road infrastructure project in Australia, the Mid North Coast towns it bypassed including Kempsey, Macksville and Urunga, the stated reasons for bypassing a town, the reported travel-time and road-safety outcomes, the scale of the Woolgoolga to Ballina section, and the Coffs Harbour bypass as the final stage. A NSW parliamentary committee wants the government to urgently investigate labour exploitation in Coffs Harbour and the Nambucca Valley https://theheadland.au/horticulture/modern-slavery-report-coffs-nambucca/ https://theheadland.au/horticulture/modern-slavery-report-coffs-nambucca/ Tue, 18 Aug 2026 01:19:00 GMT The Legislative Council's Modern Slavery Committee tabled Report no. 4 on 6 August 2026 with 31 recommendations. Recommendation 7 names Coffs Harbour and the Nambucca Valley and calls for an urgent government investigation into allegations of systemic labour exploitation and modern slavery. Australia's banana industry started at Coffs Harbour in 1891. The state now grows four per cent of the crop https://theheadland.au/horticulture/banana-industry-birthplace-four-per-cent/ https://theheadland.au/horticulture/banana-industry-birthplace-four-per-cent/ Mon, 17 Aug 2026 23:19:00 GMT Northern NSW was home to Australia's first major commercial banana plantations and led the country through most of the 1900s. Today Far North Queensland grows 94 per cent of a 369,000-tonne, $719.4 million crop and NSW grows 4 per cent, while the same region became the country's blueberry capital. Port Macquarie-Hastings has met every month this year. Its agendas page still points at a portal that stops in October https://theheadland.au/councils/pmhc-business-papers-gap/ https://theheadland.au/councils/pmhc-business-papers-gap/ Sun, 16 Aug 2026 04:55:00 GMT Port Macquarie-Hastings Council states that Ordinary Council meeting agendas are available by close of business the Thursday before each meeting and minutes within three business days. Every route from its website lands on portmacquarie.infocouncil.biz, whose year filter runs 2013 to 2025 with no 2026 option and whose most recent Ordinary Council agenda is dated 16 October 2025. In five weeks, volunteers and donors bought $345,901 of equipment for Mid North Coast hospitals https://theheadland.au/health/community-funded-hospital-equipment-2026/ https://theheadland.au/health/community-funded-hospital-equipment-2026/ Wed, 05 Aug 2026 15:18:00 GMT Six Mid North Coast Local Health District releases published between 1 July and 4 August 2026 record community-funded equipment for hospitals at Coffs Harbour, Kempsey and Dorrigo. The stated amounts total $345,901.07, and a sixth donation has no figure attached. Seven decisions you can still influence on the Mid North Coast, and all of them close this month https://theheadland.au/councils/open-consultations-august-2026/ https://theheadland.au/councils/open-consultations-august-2026/ Mon, 03 Aug 2026 23:00:00 GMT Every open council consultation across Coffs Harbour, Port Macquarie-Hastings and Kempsey as at 4 August 2026, with what each decides and when it closes. Coffs wants to delete one number from its planning rules. It would put 5,000 blocks in play https://theheadland.au/councils/coffs-dual-occupancy-rule-change/ https://theheadland.au/councils/coffs-dual-occupancy-rule-change/ Thu, 30 Jul 2026 10:10:00 GMT The City of Coffs Harbour has endorsed a planning proposal removing the 800 square-metre minimum lot size for dual occupancy in R2 low density residential zones, which the council says would make about 5,000 more properties eligible. It goes to the NSW planning department for gateway determination. The Mid North Coast health board has a permanent chair again, after most of a year with an interim one https://theheadland.au/health/mnclhd-board-chair-appointed/ https://theheadland.au/health/mnclhd-board-chair-appointed/ Tue, 28 Jul 2026 11:00:00 GMT Mid North Coast Local Health District has appointed Brendan Walsh as Board Chair. The district's own announcement records that the previous chair finished in late 2025 and the deputy served as interim chair through the first half of 2026. The Coffs Harbour university campus is a workforce anchor the region undervalues: inside SCU's $12 million health-training building https://theheadland.au/university-economy/scu-coffs-campus-workforce-anchor/ https://theheadland.au/university-economy/scu-coffs-campus-workforce-anchor/ Fri, 24 Jul 2026 14:30:00 GMT Southern Cross University's Coffs Harbour campus has more than 1,200 students across Health, Education and Marine Science, and a $12 million Health Sciences Building fitted with a simulated four-bed hospital ward, programmable high-fidelity mannequins, occupational-therapy training kitchens and bathrooms with ceiling hoists, and motion-capture for exercise science. For a region whose binding health constraint is workforce, a campus that trains nurses, midwives, therapists and psychologists on the ground is part of the answer that hospital buildings and housing grants cannot supply on their own. A considered read of what the campus is, and why it matters. Coffs Harbour leans on visitors more than most of NSW: tourism is 14% of the local economy and about one in eight jobs https://theheadland.au/community/coffs-tourism-economy-one-in-eight-jobs/ https://theheadland.au/community/coffs-tourism-economy-one-in-eight-jobs/ Fri, 24 Jul 2026 13:40:00 GMT Modelled estimates put tourism at 14.0% of Coffs Harbour's economy by output and by value added, against 9.3% and 9.4% for New South Wales, and at 4,741 jobs, about 12% of all local employment, roughly one in eight local jobs. Since 2019/20, just before COVID, tourism output is up more than $300 million and tourism employment up more than 1,400 jobs. A read of how much a tourism town leans on visitors, and what that concentration means as both a strength and an exposure. Nambucca Valley Council deferred the rules for its own Valla growth area, and recorded no reason why https://theheadland.au/councils/valla-growth-area-housing-rules-deferred/ https://theheadland.au/councils/valla-growth-area-housing-rules-deferred/ Fri, 24 Jul 2026 13:15:00 GMT Valla is the Nambucca Valley's designated place to put new housing, on land the council owns and has been readying since 2012. On 22 July 2026 the council was due to set the first building-height limits and minimum lot sizes for the precinct and forward them to the Minister for Planning. It deferred the item, unanimously (8 votes to 0), with no reason recorded in the minutes. A read of how slowly regional housing land comes online, even on land a council already owns. The Coffs hospital is built. Now the hard question is the workforce, and the workforce is a housing question https://theheadland.au/health/coffs-hospital-built-now-the-workforce-question/ https://theheadland.au/health/coffs-hospital-built-now-the-workforce-question/ Fri, 24 Jul 2026 13:00:00 GMT The $194 million Coffs Harbour hospital expansion is complete. The state's more recent move is $5.5 million for health-worker accommodation, part of a $200.1 million, four-year program targeting more than 500 workers and families across regional NSW. A read of how regional health's binding constraint has moved from the building to the workforce. Where the Mid North Coast flood recovery sits: the $56.3 million package shows a region in the long middle https://theheadland.au/flood-recovery/where-the-flood-recovery-sits/ https://theheadland.au/flood-recovery/where-the-flood-recovery-sits/ Fri, 24 Jul 2026 12:40:00 GMT More than a year after the record May 2025 flood, the latest recovery marker is a $56.3 million DRFA package announced in April 2026. Its composition, weighted to cleanup, environmental restoration and the human tail, shows what phase the recovery is in. Australia's blueberry capital, by the numbers: Coffs Harbour anchors a $505 million crop that grew more than a third in a single year https://theheadland.au/horticulture/australias-blueberry-capital-by-the-numbers/ https://theheadland.au/horticulture/australias-blueberry-capital-by-the-numbers/ Fri, 24 Jul 2026 12:10:00 GMT The most recent industry figures put Australia's blueberry crop at $505.1 million and 27,540 tonnes, up 36% in a single year. New South Wales grows about 86% of it, and the national handbook centres that production on the Coffs Harbour region. The Coffs Harbour bypass enters its final year: the last bridge is under way, and 12,000 vehicles a day are about to leave the CBD https://theheadland.au/transport-bypass/coffs-harbour-bypass-final-year/ https://theheadland.au/transport-bypass/coffs-harbour-bypass-final-year/ Fri, 24 Jul 2026 11:40:00 GMT Work has begun on the final bridge of the $2.27 billion Coffs Harbour bypass, the last piece of the decades-long Pacific Highway upgrade. The 14-kilometre route opens to traffic in late 2026, taking up to 12,000 vehicles a day out of the Coffs Harbour CBD.