The next Brisbane battleground in Australia's hardware wars Residents in Brisbane's western suburbs are now bracing to become the latest battlefield in Australia's hardware wars. Bunnings Warehouse hopes to build its biggest-ever Bunnings Warehouse in Keperra - a 25,000 square metre "big box" on the eight-hectare site of the Keperra Quarry on Settlement Road, to be completed by 2015. Meanwhile arch rival Masters is building a store three kilometres away in Everton Park, at the old Woolworths distribution centre. Despite having only opened its first store in August 2011, Masters - owned by Woolworths - is planning a further 50 Masters stores, after already opening 20. As Keperra residents opposed to the new Bunnings gather signatures, the rivals continue to throw down the gauntlet in other areas of Brisbane. Only last week, Bunnings began work on its $38 million Manly West store, located just 2km from a Masters store at Tingalpa. The hardware chain, owned by Australia's largest retailer Wesfarmers, already has 280 stores Australia-wide, with 167 of those described as "big box" hardware and garden supply centres. Its biggest Australian store is a 16,000 square metre "box" in Vermont, Victoria. Keperra resident Chris Taylor said few residents were even aware that Bunnings wanted to put Australia's largest hardware store on the Settlement Road site, let alone one this big. ""I was pretty surprised at the sheer scale and size of what was proposed,"" Mr Taylor said. Worse, he says, public comments on the proposed Bunnings development at Keperra, which includes a 17,000 square metre Bunnings store, two fast food outlets and two additional warehouses, must be received by Wednesday. Bunnings' application requires the Keperra Quarry site first to be rezoned, then for major traffic modifications on Settlement Road before the application is considered. Mr Taylor said he had already collected 300 signatures from residents in nearby suburbs on a petition saying the Bunnings store is just too big for the Keperra site. Besides which, he said, Bunnings already had a store five kilometres away at Stafford. Mr Taylor said the Enoggera and Districts Local Area Plan - which supercede the larger scale City Plan - recommend that a small-scale residential or retail development, or a child care facility, be built on the site. ""I don't know how you could possibly shoehorn Australia's largest Bunnings development as small scale development,"" Mr Taylor said. ""This appears to me to be Bunnings responding to the Masters store in Everton Park." He said the site was an important ""keystone""in the local greenbelt and traffic management study prepared for the application showed a 30 per cent increase in traffic near schools. Bunnings would have to contribute to traffic lights at an intersection opposite the quarry. A spokeswoman from Bunnings Warehouses was contacted and promised to reply, but no reply or comments were received yesterday or last night from Bunnings.