The Park Centre for Mental Health is a heritage-listed psychiatric hospital at 60 Grindle Road, Wacol, City of Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. It is one of the largest psychiatric hospitals in Australia. The hospital provides a range of mental health services, including extended inpatient care, mental health research, education and a high security psychiatric unit. It was designed by Kersey Cannan and built from 1866 to 1923. It is also known as Goodna Hospital for the Insane, Goodna Mental Hospital, Woogaroo Lunatic Asylum, and Wolston Park Hospital Complex. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 21 October 1992.
The Wolston Park Hospital Complex, opened in 1865, occupies a site on the banks of the Brisbane River at Wacol and encompasses a number of mental health facilities and ancillary services operated by the Queensland government since inception of the asylum.
The hospital employs around 450 people, including 220 nurses and 20 doctors. There are also another 80 allied health staff, and 50 administration personnel. In addition there are 70 support staff, including maintenance, groundskeeping, security and laundry staff.
History Planning Prior to 1859, mentally ill people in the colony of Queensland had been sent to Sydney. Following the Separation of Queensland, they were lodged instead at the Brisbane Gaol. In 1861 the government instructed Colonial Architect Charles Tiffin to report on a suitable site and draw up plans for a 400-bed asylum. Tiffin recommended an area of land on the banks of the Brisbane River halfway between Brisbane and Ipswich, which was rejected by the Queensland Government in favour of another site close by, upstream at the junction of the Brisbane River and Woogaroo Creek.
The site of the new asylum had "been formerly occupied by the residence of Dr Stephen Simpson, the Commissioner of Crown lands." Dr Simpson was appointed Commissioner for Crown Lands for the Moreton Bay District in 1842 when the area was first opened up for free settlement following the closure of the Moreton Bay penal settlement. He was also the acting administrator, until the arrival of John Clements Wickham, and a Justice of the Peace. Simpson's first home in the colony, built in 1843–1844, was at Woogaroo. In 1851, when the opportunity to buy land in the area arose, he purchased 640 acres to the east and soon built Wolston House further down the Brisbane River.
An 1861 survey plan indicates the presence of a house between the mouth of Woogaroo Creek and the small dam which still exists to the east of the current Wolston Park Golf Club clubhouse. If this plan is accurate, the house, most likely Simpson's, would have been sited just south-west of the clubhouse. Late 1860s plans of the asylum's original buildings indicate that they were located at the east end of the current clubhouse.
Construction Tenders for the first stage of construction of the asylum were let in 1863 and by the end of 1864 sufficient buildings were completed for the asylum to begin operation. The Woogaroo Lunatic Asylum opened on 10 January 1865. On 12 January, seven prison warders (two of them women) and ten police constables escorted 57 male and 12 female lunatics from Brisbane Gaol to Woogaroo, travelling by river on the steamer Settler. The 69 patients were accommodated in a two-storeyed brick building initially intended to be the administration block (no longer extant). Male patients were accommodated on the first floor and part of the ground floor. Females occupied a section of the ground floor. A tall timber fence surrounded the building and timber outbuildings accommodated a kitchen, bathroom and staff areas. Dr Kersey Cannan was appointed as Superintendent and a residence was constructed for him on the site (no longer extant). This first stage of the asylum was located at the southern end of the site between the Brisbane River and Woogaroo Creek, with the river providing access to the site. Plans of the site made and in 1878, indicate that a cemetery or graveyard was established at the far western end of the site, near the confluence of Woogaroo Creek and the Brisbane River.
In 1866 a ward for fee-paying patients was erected on an adjacent ridge about to the east of the main buildings (later Female Wards 1 & 2). The building was constructed from local sandstone extracted from a nearby sandstone quarry formerly owned by Joshua Jeays, which was also the source of stone for the construction of Parliament House in 1864. The superintendent Dr Canaan claimed responsibility for the building's design, based on principles recommended in the standard treatise on asylum construction, The Construction and Government of Lunatic Asylums of 1847 by John Conolly. The Woogaroo Asylum was not, however, in a position to receive fee-paying patients and the building was unoccupied for two years until alterations were made so that female patients could be transferred to this block. A second storey was added, constructed to the design of Charles Tiffin in 1875, and other substantial alterations and additions were made to the building in both 1904 and 1923. This building accommodated female patients for over 100 years.
Inquiries In 1867 the first of many Government inquiries into the operations of the asylum took place, with the Government appointing Dr Henry Challinor to investigate conditions there. Two further inquiries occurred in 1869 - the first inquiry was conducted by public servants, and the second by a select committee of members from both houses of Queensland Parliament. Dr Cannan was dismissed from his post as a result of the first inquiry. The second inquiry revealed a multitude of mistakes and incompetency and a number of its conclusions related to the inappropriate and insufficient accommodation on site and the improvement of cooking facilities and the provision of a decent water supply. On the recommendation of the select committee, the Queensland Government introduced the Lunacy Act of 1869, based on similar legislation in other Australian colonies and Britain.
It was not until a Royal Commission was established in 1877 to investigate Woogaroo Asylum and other reception houses in the colony that the Government was forced to take the continuing problems at the asylum more seriously. Despite the construction of two cottage wards in the early 1870s (no longer extant), overcrowding remained a chronic problem and the commission urged the construction of additional wards, improvements to existing cells, upgrading of services, the planting of shade trees, the establishment of recreation facilities and the provision of employment for patients. A modest building program began in 1878 with the construction of a cottage ward for 60 female patients and continued with a block of cells for troublesome female patients in 1879, two wards each for 35 patients in the male and female sections in 1880 as well as the construction of a kitchen and laundry building to service 500 patients (these buildings are no longer extant).
In August 2024, the Queensland Government commissioned an independent review into treatment and care provided at Wolston Park Hospital between 1950 and 2000. The review was led by mental health expert Professor Robert Bland AM and provided former patients, residents, family members and carers with an opportunity to share their experiences. The review was established following calls from former patients and advocates for greater recognition of historical treatment practices at the institution. Participation was voluntary and the review was intended as a trauma-informed truth-telling process rather than a legal inquiry or compensation scheme. The final report was released on 19 December 2025.
The report documented accounts from former patients and families describing physical abuse, sexual violence, overmedication, misuse of electroconvulsive therapy, institutional neglect, and other alleged human rights abuses occurring during the review period. The review identified recurring themes relating to treatment practices, systemic failures, and the long-term impacts experienced by former patients and their families. Queensland Health noted that the report presented participants' reported experiences and was not intended to determine liability or make findings regarding the factual accuracy of individual allegations. The report was released publicly alongside a collection of participant stories to acknowledge the experiences of those affected by the hospital's operations.Review-into-wolston-park-hospital
Expansion
A boom in the Queensland economy and a major increase in expenditure on public works was the impetus for a more substantial building program at the asylum during the 1880s. At the same time, the population of the state was increasing rapidly and accompanying social changes brought greater numbers of admissions to the asylum, then known as the Goodna Asylum. The hospital population doubled in the two decades from 1880. Two new cottage wards (one of which is now known as Bostock House, 1885) and a refractory ward were erected in the female section and a new refractory ward was constructed (no longer extant) and major additions to the existing No 1 ward were undertaken in the male section. Despite this new work, conditions for patients scarcely improved as the additional accommodation barely matched the growth in patient numbers. New legislation was introduced with the Insanity Act of 1884 replacing the Lunacy Act of 1869. It was modelled on New South Wales legislation and reflected the growing medicalisation of the treatment of madness. The term lunacy was replaced by insanity and the institution where such persons were treated became known as a hospital for the insane rather than an asylum. This Act consolidated the State's role in the treatment and regulation of insane people and remained in force for over fifty years.
Flooding In 1890 the asylum experienced severe flooding as the Brisbane River rose to a height of , the highest level ever recorded. The entire male section was inundated; buildings, fences and other structures were seriously damaged and patients had to be re-located. The decision was made to abandon the low-lying area near the river where the main male section was located and consolidate it on higher ground where two wards had already been erected. The relocation brought the complex closer to the Main Line railway (opened in 1875), which replaced the river as the primary means of access to the hospital. The Recreation Hall was erected in 1890 and was used as a sewing room by female patients during the days and was also available for dances, concerts and church services.
The male section was further damaged by in the 1893 Brisbane flood that also inundated the main staff residences. In line with the decision to relocate the male section on higher ground, work began on an outdoor recreation area and Fleming House, a two storeyed brick building with accommodation for 50 male patients, was opened in 1898. Verandahs were located at ground level on the northern side of the building, overlooking the cricket oval that had been laid out by patient labour. The same year, a substantial brick residence (now Manor House), replacing a timber house badly damaged by the 1893 flood, was erected for the new medical superintendent, James Hogg, appointed in 1898. The residence was located on high ground but with its main elevation facing south-east, away from the asylum complex. Most of the other staff resided off the site. For many decades the hospital was serviced by employees who lived in the local area and there are now a number of staff who have a family history of employment at the complex going back generations. During Hogg's period in charge, the complex became known as the Goodna Hospital for the Insane.
Further expansion