Upper Mount Gravatt, a residential suburb which matured during the 1960s-70s, is on Logan Road, 10 km south-east of central Brisbane. The suburb's name and origins are described under the entry on Mount Gravatt. Upper Mount Gravatt was officially gazetted as a place name in 1969 but came into existence when a local primary school was opened in 1929.
In the 1920s soldier settlement farms were allotted in Mount Gravatt (which then included present day Upper Mount Gravatt), and the Upper Mount Gravatt primary school in Logan Road was opened in 1929. The district was rural, its social centre being the showground (1915) further north in Logan Road. The post office directory in 1949 recorded several pig and poultry farmers at Upper Mount Gravatt together with the Pacific bakery and the Pacific Golf Club in Kessels Rd. (The golf club, now identified by Nagle, Pickworth etc streets, was transferred to Carindale.)
In 1951 the Logan Road tram service was extended from Holland Park to Selborne Street, Mount Gravatt, shortening feeder bus services from Upper Mount Gravatt to the terminus to about 2 km. As Mount Gravatt residential development proceeded during the 1950s and car ownership increased, there was a spillover of new housing into Upper Mount Gravatt. School attendances were 301 in 1952, 872 in 1962 and 1369 in 1972. There was a drive-in shopping centre (1966) in Logan Road, Mt Gravatt, and when the time came for a major south-eastern retail facility an adequate site was found on Logan Road in the south of Upper Mount Gravatt. Garden City (1970) became a regional shopping centre with a department store, two discount department stores, two supermarkets and 290 other shops (2003). In the early 1980s the South Eastern Freeway was extended to Upper Mount Gravatt, passing Garden City before meeting Logan Road.
Upper Mount Gravatt has a community centre, a memorial hall, a bowling club, St Bernards Catholic primary school (1953), the Clairvaux-McKillop Catholic College (1965) and another drive-in shopping centre, Palmdale, opposite Garden City.
Construction of a 12-storey hotel featuring a conference facility as well as hotel and residential units was approved in 2014.
Upper Mount Gravatt's census populations have been:
| Census Date | Population |
|---|---|
| 1947 | 921 |
| 1976 | 9296 |
| 2001 | 7340 |
| 2006 | 7916 |
| 2011 | 8851 |
Gwen Robinson, Mt Gravatt: bush to suburbs, Mount Gravatt, G. Robinson, 2006
Robyn Coleman, Upper Mount Gravatt State School, 1929-79, Mount Gravatt, Upper Mount Gravatt State School Jubilee Committee, 1979
