Queensland Coast
Queensland’s Famous Coast
Queensland is famous for its stunning coastline. With world-class surf breaks in the south, the world’s largest sand island –Fraser Island – along our central coast, and the world’s largest living organism – the Great Barrier Reef – to the north, our coastline is incredibly valuable and precious. Queensland’s coastline is approximately 6,973 kilometres long, with another 6,374 km of island coastline, making it one of the longest in Australia.
Coastal management in Queensland is conducted at multiple levels. The Department of Environment and Heritage Protection manages and regulates the Queensland coast through the Coastal Management Plan, as well as through numerous planning instruments and permits that regulate development on the coast. The day to day management of Queensland’s coasts are conducted at local government level, with each Local Government Authority responsible for the management of their stretch of coast line. In addition, the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park is managed by the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, and numerous Natural Resource Management groups, university and institutional groups, waterways authorities and regulators, and citizen science groups provide support, monitoring, research and regulation in within their jurisdiction.
ACS Queensland
ACS Queensland supports the close and careful management of our precious coastline. We seek to provide education, awareness and information about the coastal environment in Queensland to practioners, specialists, citizen scientists, and the general community to promote a deeper and more informed understanding of Queensland’s beautiful coast.
In addition, we believe that our role is to provide information on changes to management, legislation, and planning and development decisions that impact our coastline to the coastal community. We believe that our role includes providing submissions to government where proposed changes to legislation, management, or proposed development has the potential to impact the coast, coastal ecosystems, and the nearshore marine environment. As coastal specialists, we believe that it is our duty to provide interested parties with factual and informed information on changes and impacts to Queensland’s coasts, in a way that enables our community to determine whether or not those changes or impacts have positive or negative implications to the coastal environment.
News from ACS Queensland
The Queensland Chapter is regenerating after a quiet past year and is looking for input from chapter members as to our direction, events, and offerings. We are looking forward to developing more networking events, meet ups, news updates and communications to share with Queensland membership in the coming months.
If you have any ideas you’d like to share with us, or want to be involved in the committee, please contact us at qld@australiancoastalsociety.org
Queensland Coastal Conference 5-7 September, Airlie Beach
The Queensland Coastal Conference is a biannual event jointly hosted by the Australian Coastal Society and Reef Catchments. The 2017 conference sees the event celebrating its 10th year and will be held in Airlie Beach in September. Registrations are open now, visit www.qldcoastalconference.org.au .
Cyclone Debbie
The ongoing clean up from the aftermath of Cyclone Debbie is likely to take several months and potentially longer, and coastal and marine impact assessments are still continuing. ACS is keen to hear from you if you have any observations or have noted and major changes in your area following the Cyclone and flooding that followed. Contact us at austcoastsocqld@gmail.com with any observations, photos, or data you would be willing to share with the coastal community.