page_title: Queensland
section_title: Geography and environment
hierarchical_section_title: Queensland / Geography and environment
caption_attribution_description: Binna Burra. Photograph by w:User:Johncatsoulis John Catsoulis, jtc@embedded.com.au Binna Burra. Photograph by John Catsoulis, jtc@embedded.com.au
context_page_description: Queensland is a state of Australia. It is the second-largest and third-most populous Australian state. It is a federated state and a parliamentary constitutional monarchy. Situated in the north-east of the country, it is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean. To its north is the Torres Strait, separating the Australian mainland from Papua New Guinea. With an area of 1,852,642 square kilometres, Queensland is the world's sixth-largest sub-national entity, and is larger than all but 15 countries. Due to its size, Queensland's geographical features and climates are diverse, including tropical rainforests, rivers, coral reefs, mountain ranges and sandy beaches in its tropical and sub-tropical coastal regions, as well as deserts and savanna in the semi-arid and desert climactic regions of its interior.
  Queensland has a population of over 5.1 million, concentrated along the coast and particularly in South East Queensland. The capital and largest city in the state is Brisbane, Australia's third-largest city.
context_section_description: With a total area of 1,852,642 square kilometres (715,309 square miles), Queensland is an expansive state with a highly diverse range of climates and geographical features. If Queensland were an independent nation, it would be the world's 16th largest, being approximately the same size as Mexico, Indonesia and Mongolia.
  Queensland's eastern coastline borders the Coral Sea, an arm of the Pacific Ocean. The state is bordered by the Torres Strait to the north, with Boigu Island off the coast of New Guinea representing the northern extreme of its territory. The triangular Cape York Peninsula, which points toward New Guinea, is the northernmost part of the state's mainland. West of the peninsula's tip, northern Queensland is bordered by the Gulf of Carpentaria. To the west, Queensland is bordered by the Northern Territory, at the 138th meridian east, and to the southwest by northeastern South Australia. The state's southern border with New South Wales is constituted in the east by the watershed from Point Danger to the Dumaresq River, and the Dumaresq, Macintyre and Barwon rivers. The west of the southern border is defined by the 29th parallel south (including some minor historical encroachments), until it reaches South Australia.
  Like much of eastern Australia, the Great Dividing Range runs roughly parallel with, and inland from, the coast, and areas west of the range are more arid than the humid coastal regions. The Great Barrier Reef, which is the world's largest coral reef system, runs parallel to the state's Coral Sea coast between the Torres Strait and Fraser Island. Queensland's coastline includes the world's three largest sand islands: Fraser, Moreton and North Stradbroke.
  The state contains six World Heritage-listed preservation areas: the Great Barrier Reef along the Coral Sea coast, Fraser Island on the Wide Bay–Burnett regions's coastline, the wet tropics in Far North Queensland including the Daintree Rainforest, Lamington National Park in South East Queensland, the Riversleigh fossil sites in North West Queensland, and the Gondwana Rainforests in South East Queensland.
caption: The McPherson Range at Lamington National Park in South East Queensland
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