Inland towns on the Queensland border are becoming "vibrant again" as they welcome back familiar faces with today's reopening.
In Texas, where the border splits the town along the Dumaresq river, locals can now move freely to access vital services and businesses are seeing the return of loyal customers.
Tyre shop employee Larissa Baker said the most difficult part of the long-running border closures was seeing her community divided.
"Locals will be able to become locals again," she said.
"The division that it's caused within the community has caused a lot of concern for a lot of people … it's been difficult to live with, unfortunately."
But she said Texas had fared better than other border regions like Tweed Heads and the Gold Coast.
"The massive difference for us is we don't have two CBDs straddling the border," Ms Baker said.
"We have a business area on the Queensland side and a couple of 100 metres across the river paddocks and paddocks of families, and people that rely on the community this side of the border."
Getting on with it
David Thomson, who has lived in Texas for 70 years, says the border reopening is the "best thing to have ever happened".
"We've got to get on with life," he said.
"People can come back in, get their groceries, get their fuel, get business done."
The recovery process now begins as small towns try to recoup months of losses.
But for some it is too late.
"One supermarket closed down because the cars weren't coming through here — totally dependent on caravanners and so forth," Mr Thomson said.
"[The owner] said, 'I can't survive', so that was pretty devastating for the town.
