The pergola entrance to the Blue Mountains Cultural Centre

.

^Old Growth?

.

The new Blue Mountains Cultural Centre opened at 30 Parke Street, Katoomba in the Blue Mountains west of Sydney on Saturday 17th November 2012.

The Blue Mountains Cultural Centre is a very large complex for the town of Katoomba and the sparsely populated region.

It features:

• an art gallery
• state-of-the-art library
• an extensive scenic viewing platform towards the Jamison Valley (and World Heritage wilderness beyond)
• seminar room
• multi-purpose workshop
• coffee shop
• gift shop
• meeting rooms
• an interpretative centre for the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area.

.

It is a “purpose built cultural precinct; a place that simultaneously celebrates our unique sense of place, and allows us to explore what it means to live here, and share those understandings with those who visit our home.”

.

The Jamison Valley Wilderness

.

Planning for the Blue Mountains Cultural Centre commenced way back in 1998 and there was much local community consultation in the planning process including with local Aboriginal people.

The building was commissioned by the local Blue Mountains Council and funded mainly by the New South Wales Government by more than $6 million.  The Cultural Centre was designed by architects Hassell & Scott Carver Architects and built by Richard Crookes Constructions.

The Cultural Centre, now built, is positioned on the top (roof) level of a building which has, in the main, been constructed for a new relocated Coles supermarket and shopping arcade.

Blue Mountains Cultural Centre entrance

.

While the now operational purposes of the Blue Mountains Cultural Centre promise to have considerable merit, there are two notable drawbacks associated with the recent construction of this building, which should not be forgotten to history.

.

1.    The Entrance Pergola appears to be of  ‘Tasmanian Oak‘

.

.

The distinctive colour and texture of Tasmanian Oak  (treated and stained)

These large posts and the beams have few knots and clearly have been sourced from the heartwood of very large and old native trees.

.

A ‘Tassie Oak’ comparison..

Tasmanian Oak in Tasmania

.

The name ‘Tasmanian Oak‘ was originally used by early European timber workers who believed the eucalypts showed the same strength as English Oak.  When sourced from Tasmania, the wood is called Tasmanian Oak.  When sourced from Victoria, the wood is called ‘Victorian Ash‘ or ‘Mountain Ash‘.

This uniquely Australian hardwood timber is light-coloured, ranging from straw to light reddish brown.  It continues to be used in the building trade for panelling, flooring, furniture, framing, doors, stairs, external structures, joinery, reconstituted board and even as pulp for paper.

As the tallest flowering plant in the world, Eucalyptus regnans grow up to 100 metres tall.  Whereas Eucalyptus delegatensis and Eucalyptus obliqua do not reach these heights; instead reaching about 70m with the tallest trees achieving 90 metres, which is no less considerable.

Read More about >Tasmanian Oak

.

Nevertheless, all these species comprise timber logged from native old growth forests, not plantations.  Such forests are rare and fast disappearing due to excessive logging practices – their dependent ecosystems, flora and fauna included.

The Pygmy Possum (Genus Cercartetus)

.

So logging and use of this native old growth timber is unsustainable, despite Australian timber industry certification claims, which are proven dubious.

Tasmanian Oak/Mountain Ash (Eucalyptus regnans)

.

A likely justification for the use of Tasmanian Oak for the Blue Mountains Cultural Centre’s entrance pergola is that Tasmanian Oak being a strong hardwood timber is load-bearing with few knots.  While steel or another composite material could have been used, it is probable that the Tasmanian Oak was inadertently chosen for its aesthetic appeal, ignoring sustainability criteria.

Tasmanian Oak, like many Australian native hardwood timbers, is durable, termite and borer resistant, and fire resistant which makes its suitable for such an external structure, plus it is readily available and so a comparatively affordable building material.  The timber has few knots because it is sourced from old growth trees, perhaps aged over one hundred years, and so the trunk is very tall and straight between the tree’s base and the branch canopy.

The Blue Mountains are dominated by Eucalypt forests, which contain flammable natural eucalyptus oil. Although the Cultural Centre is wholly within the township of Katoomba some distance from native forests, compliance with the Building Code of Australia would have mandated the building material options for the pergola, including the requirement that the external structure be of fire resistant material.  Since the Cultural Centre is situated within the least risk buffer zone of a designated Bushfire Prone Area, the choice of building material would also have would been mandated under the Australian Standard AS 3959 ‘Construction of Buildings in Bushfire Prone Areas’ and with local council’s Blue Mountains Local Environment Plan 2005 – Regulation 86 : ‘Bush fire constructions standards’.

Under AS 3959, the construction of new buildings, the use of timber as an extrenal building material is permitted in the lower risk levels provided the timber species must comply with minimum crierian for Fire Retardant Treated Timber.   The following timber species have been tested and found to meet the required parameters without having to be subjected to fire retardant treatment:

• Blackbutt
• Merbau
• Red Ironbark
• River Red Gum
• Silvertop Ash
• Spotted Gum
• Turpentine

.

.

The above hardwoods are all threatened species and are disappearing fast; all Australian bar Merbau which is being depleted from old growth Indonesian rainforests.

The timber used in the Cultural Centre’s timber pergola is arguably of Tasmanian Oak, which is known variously by the common names Mountain Ash, Victorian Ash, Swamp Gum, or Stringy Gum.

It is a species of Eucalyptus native to southeastern Australia, in Tasmania and Victoria. Historically, it has been known to attain heights over 100 metres (330 ft) and is one of the tallest tree species in the world.  In native forests, the two species (Mountain Ash & Alpine Ash) that are combined to produce Victorian Ash are known to be two of the world’s largest trees, occasionally growing to over 100m in height.

Yet all these Australian native hardwood timbers are increasingly becoming scarcer as they are logged for such fire-resistant application.   

.

The Building Standard for Fire Retardant Treated Timber is driving deforestation of Australian Old Growth Forests.

.

These old growth timbers are the dominant canaopy species for wet eucalypt forests restricted to cool, deep soiled, mostly mountainous areas to 1,000 metres (3,300 ft) altitude with high rainfall of over 1,200 millimetres (47 in) per year. The trees grow very quickly, at more than a metre a year, and can reach 65 metres (213 ft) in 50 years, with an average life-span of 400 years.

Eucalyptus regnans is the tallest of all flowering plants, and possibly the tallest of all plants, although no living specimens can make that claim.The tallest measured living specimen, named Centurion, stands 101 metres tall in Tasmania.

Before the discovery of Centurion, the tallest known specimen was Icarus Dream, which was rediscovered in Tasmania in January, 2005 and is 97 metres (318 ft) high. It was first measured by surveyors at 98.8 metres (324 ft) in 1962 but the documentation had been lost.  Sixteen living trees in Tasmania have been reliably measured in excess of 90 metres (300 ft).

Historically, the tallest individual is claimed to be the Ferguson Tree, at 132.6 metres (435 ft), found in the Watts River region of Victoria in 1871 or 1872.

Eucalyptus regnans

.

The fallen logs continue supporting a rich variety of life for centuries more on the forest floor.   These restricted mountain ash forests provide vital yet shrinking habitat for many of Australia’s threatened species of fauna.

.

2.  Construction created considerable land fill

.

It was observed throughout the construction phase of the Blue Mountains Cultural Centre, that daily large skips of builders waste from the site were loaded alongside in Parke Street.

These commercial skips were consistently yellow in colour and the same size – about six meters long and two meters wide (12 cubic metre capacity).  Typically there were two such skips positioned and loaded with builders’ waste from the construction site each weekday.  This was observed over the course of a year up until August 2012.  They were loaded by bobcat-style machinery with all types of mixed rubbish – concrete, unwanted insulation, scrap metal, rubble, empty cans, you name it.  There was no separation of waste observed for recycling.  It would all have been trucked to landfill – possibly to either the nearby Katoomba or Blaxland waste management facilities, or else off-Mountain somewhere.

Commercial skip used to cart away builders’ waste from the construction site

.

A conservative estimate of the land fill volume generated from the Cultural Centre construction site, which also included the Coles shopping complex, over the course of the year would be 12 cubic metres x 2 skips x 5 days x 42 weeks (generously allowing for 10 non work weeks out of 52) =  over 5,000 cubic metres of land fill!

.

.

Cultural Centre’s Green Credentials

.

The above two environmental impacts are far from encouraging for this high profile community-serving 21st Century building, and within a World Heritage Area to boot.

The interpretative concept is one that is meant to inspire locals and visitors alike.  So these two impacts are concerning and perhaps need to be clarified in the public literature produced by the Blue Mountains Council which commissioned the Cultural Centre.

The public impression promoted by the Blue Mountains Council is that the Cultural Centre is a eco-friendly building deserving praise.

<<It has free wi-fi and features a range of green initiatives including double-glazed windows, solar panels, rainwater harvesting, and low-energy LED lights in the gallery.>>

.

<<The Blue Mountains Cultural Centre has a range of green (building) features that ensure that its impacts on the World Heritage environment is kept to a minimum.

Some of the features include:

• A fully insulated roof, double-brick air cavity walls and double-glazed windows assist to insulate the building.
• Extensive rainwater collection, harvested by the Centre and the Carrington Hotel and stored onsite, in an underground 50,000 litre tank
• On the roof there are 54, 10kW solar panels to reduce the Centre’s reliance on traditional energy sources.

• The ‘green roof’ treats a portion of the Cultural Centre’s water run-off (with the aid of a UV disinfection system) that is then used for irrigation and toilet flushing.
• The Centre is lit with a combination of efficient, long-life lighting sources and lighting zoning to allow separate switching and dimming of areas adjacent to windows.
• The City Art Gallery uses LED lighting technology to significantly reduce power consumption.
• The building orientation itself is designed to provide protection to the open courtyard areas from the prevailing westerly winds and exposure to northern sunlight.

.

With these initiatives in place, the Cultural Centre aims to reduce water consumption by 5.5 million litres each year and reduce energy usage of 1.8 million kWh/year — enough energy to power 246 homes in the region.>>

.

A core part of the Blue Mountains Council’s 25 Year Vision for the Blue Mountains region focussed on ‘Looking After the Environment‘:

<<We value our surrounding bushland and the World Heritage National Park.

Recognising that the Blue Mountains natural environment is dynamic and changing, we look after and enjoy the healthy creeks and waterways, diverse flora and fauna and clean air.

Living in harmony with the environment, we care for the ecosystems and habitats that support life in the bush and in our backyards.

We conserve energy and the natural resources we use and reduce environmental impacts by living sustainably.>>

.

[Source: ‘Towards a More Sustainable Blue Mountains – A 25 Year Vision for the City, Blue Mountains Council ,2000-2025, ^http://www.sustainablebluemountains.net.au/our-city-vision/city-vision-publications/]

.

Ed:  Such are noble goals however outsourced, but if they are dismissed just as  ^’Greenwashing’  :the community message quicky becomes recognised as hollow spin and then any hard earned credibility risks being quickly lost.

.

Tasman Flax-lily (Dianella tasmanica) (blue berry) in a Blue Mountains Swamp

.

Q:  When is a protected swamp not deemed a swamp and so not worthy of protection?

Closed sedgeland dominated by Soft Twig Rush (Baumea rubiginosa)

.

A:  When unqualified local Council development planning staff are selectively blind to allow for housing development. 

Colorbond fence encroaching into the above Blue Mountains Swamp 

.

Q:  When is a protected swamp deemed a swamp worthy of protection?

A:  When quasi-qualified local Council environmental staff are selectively seeking public relations kudos and grant funding.  

The Save Our Swamps (SOS) Project

.

The Save Our Swamps (SOS) Project is a recent joint project between Blue Mountains City Council, Gosford City Council, Lithgow City Council and Wingecarribee Shire Council to protect and restore the federally listed Temperate Highland Peat Swamps on Sandstone endangered ecological community.  

It is funded through a 12 month $400,000 federal Caring for Country grant operating across all four LGAs as well as a 3 year $250,000 NSW Environmental Trust grant focused on the Blue Mountains City Council and Lithgow City Council Local Government Areas.     [Source:  Blue Mountains Council, ^http://saveourswamps.com.au/index.php]

.

Blue Mountains Swamp

.

The Blue Mountains National Park is one of seven national parks which collectively comprise a million hectares of the Greater Blue Mountains Area, which since 2000 has been listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.   This area is protected internationally for (1) its outstanding examples representing significant on-going ecological and biological processes in the evolution and development of terrestrial, fresh water, coastal and marine ecosystems and communities of plants and animals and (2) contain the most important and significant natural habitats for in-situ conservation of biological diversity, including those containing threatened species of outstanding universal value from the point of view of science or conservation.      [Read More about ^The Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage values]

.

Since 12th May 2005,  ‘Temperate Highland Peat Swamps on Sandstone‘ have been recognised as an important and rare ecological community listed as Endangered under the Australian Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999, as well as within New South Wales under the Threatened Species Conservation Act 1995 (NSW) (TSC Act).

So naturally, one would expect such swamps to be identified, mapped and ecologically protected – one would expect.  .

These swamps occur naturally in very few places on the planet, as shown (in red) in the following distribution map within south eastern Australia:

.Temperate Highland Peat Swamps on Sandstone – Global Distribution Map

.

Blue Mountains Swamps are included as part of the Temperate Highland Peat Swamps on Sandstone.   These are the top two red areas in the above map.

The Blue Mountains west of Sydney are Triassic sandstone plateaux.  Blue Mountain Swamps occur in shallow, low-sloping, often narrow headwater valleys (Keith and Benson 1988; Benson and Keith 1990), on long gentle open drainage lines in the lowest foot slopes, low-lying broad valley floors and alluvial flats (Department of Environment and Conservation 2006), and in gully heads, open depressions on ridgetops and steep valley sides associated with semi-permanent water seepage (Holland et al. 1992; Blue Mountains City Council 2005; Department of Environment and Conservation 2006).

Farmers Creek Swamp

.

Most of these swamps are situated within the Greater Blue Mountains Area and so are ecologically protected, but many are not.  Many Blue Mountains Swamps are situated just outside on the fringe lands.  Those fringe lands lie on the bush interface with human residential settlement and despite their environmental protection on paper are at risk of being bulldozed for housing development.   Such threats from development are referred to as ‘edge effects‘.   These swamps are on the edge of housing development, or put the more chronological way, housing development is being allowed to encroach upon the edge of these swamps that were there first.      Other Blue Mountains Swamps such as those up on Newnes Plateau are at risk of being bulldozed and drained for mining.

According to the Blue Mountains Council, there are less than 3,000 hectares of Blue Mountains Swamp in existence. As they predominantly comprise many small areas, they are very susceptible to edge effects.    As the urban footprint expands to the edges of the plateau, the swamps are coming under ever increasing pressure.

.

• Clearing for urban development
• Urban runoff – sediment deposition, tunnelling and channelisation from stormwater discharges
• Bushfire (both ‘wild’ and ‘hazard’ reduction)
• Weed invasion
• Nutrient enrichment (urban runoff)
• Mowing
• Grazing
• Water extraction (bores, tapping natural springs and building dams)

.

.

Blue Mountains Swamp

..

Blue Mountains Swamps – substrate characteristics

.

Blue Mountains Swamps are characterised by the constant presence of groundwater seeping along the top of impermeable claystone layers in the sandstone and reaches the surface where the claystone protrudes (Keith and Benson 1988; Holland et al. 1992; Blue Mountains City Council 2005).

The substrate tends to be a shallow black to grey coloured acid, peaty, loamy sandy soil with organic matter and are poorly drained and so tend to be either constantly or intermittently water logged (Hope and Southern 1983; Keith and Benson 1988; Benson and Keith 1990; Stricker and Brown 1994; Stricker and Wall 1994; Winning and Brown 1994; Stricker and Stroinovsky 1995; Benson and McDougall 1997; Whinam and Chilcott 2002; Department of Environment and Conservation 2006).

Blue Mountains Swamp on Newnes Plateau

The swamps naturally trap sediment and disperse rain water over a wide area and protect floors of headwater valleys from erosion.  They vary in structure and species composition according to geology, topographic location, depth of the water table, extent and duration of water logging and bushfire frequency.

.

Blue Mountains Swamps – vegetation variation

.

The structure of Blue Mountains Swamp vegetation varies from open shrubland to closed heath or open heath (dominated by shrub species but with a sedge and graminoid understorey and occasionally with scattered low trees) to sedgeland and closed sedgeland.   The Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area ids listed for its outstanding natural values, a major component of which is the high number of eucalypt species and eucalypt-dominated communities.  These can be found in a great variety of plant communities including within and upslope of Blue Mountains Swamps.

Topographic location, hydrology and soils significantly influence the dominant species composition.   Structure of the vegetation varies from closed heath or scrub to open heath to closed sedgeland or fernland.   The common cross-feature with all types is the presence of frequently waterlogged soil.

The Gully Swamp

.

Blue Mountains Swamps – Known Tree Species

.

• Eucalyptus mannifera subsp. gullickii
• Mountain Swamp Gum (Eucalyptus aquatica)
• Eucalyptus copulans
• Ed:  Blue Mountains Ash (Eucalyptus oreades), only at creek headwaters around Katoomba

 Eucalyptus mannifera (subspecies ‘gullickii’)

.

Blue Mountains Swamps – Known Shrub Species

.

• Flax-leaf Heath Myrtle  (Baeckea linifolia)
• Leptospermum juniperinum
• Hakea teretifolia
• Leptospermum grandifolium
• Grevillea acanthifolia (subspecies ‘acanthifolia’)
• Leptospermum polygalifolium
• Banksia spinulosa
• Almaleea incurvata
• Epacris obtusifolia
• Epacris hamiltonii
• Sprengelia incarnata
• Deane’s Boronia   (Boronia deanei)
• Persoonia hindii
• Swamp Bush-pea   (Pultenaea glabra)
• Bantam Bush-pea   (Pultenaea parrisiae)
• Dwarf Kerrawang   (Rulingia prostrata)

.

Flax-leaf Heath Myrtle  (Baeckea linifolia)

.

Blue Mountains Swamps – Known Fern Species

.

• Water ferns  (Blechnum nudum)
• Pouched Coral ferns Gleichenia spp  (G. dicarpa and G. microphylla)
• Umbrella ferns Sticherus spp
• King Fern   (Todea barbara)
• Drosera binata

.

Blue Mountains Swamp – is this one protected?

.

Blue Mountains Swamps – Known Sedge Species

.

• Large tussock sedge, Gymnoschoenus sphaerocephalus

• Rhizomatous sedges and cord rushes:

• Soft Twig Rush (Baumea rubiginosa)
• Lepidosperma limicola
• Ptilothrix deusta
• Lepyrodia scariosa
• Leptocarpus tenax
• Cord-rush    (Baloskion longipes)

.

‘Edge Effects’ – when housing development is allowed to encroach upon Blue Mountains Swamps

.

Blue Mountains Swamps – Known Grasses and Herbs Species

.

• Deyeuxia spp  (D. gunniana, D. quadriseta),
• Swamp Millet   (sachne globosa )
• Lachnogrostis filiformis
• Poa spp  (P. labillardierei var. labillardierei, P. sieberiana)
• Tetrarrhena turfosa
• Entolasia stricta
• Dampiera stricta
• Mirbelia rubiifolia
• Gonocarpus teucrioides
• Carex klaphakei
• Derwentia blakelyi
• Wingecarribee Gentian    ( Gentiana wingecarribiensis)
• Lepidosperma evansianum
• Yellow Loose Strife   (Lysimachia vulgaris var. davurica)
• Tawny Leek-orchid  (Prasophyllum fuscum)
• Dark Leek-orchid   (Prasophyllum uroglossum)
• Large Tongue Orchid   (Cryptostylis subulata)

.

Large Tongue Orchid (Cryptostylis subulata)

.

For further Reading visit: ^Temperate Highland Peat Swamps on Sandstone ,   ^Blue Mountains Swamps in the Sydney Basin Bioregion – profile

.

So what differentiates a Blue Mountains Swamp?

.

What is common across the above varying substrate and vegetation characteristics, that differentiates a Blue Mountains Swamp from other vegetation communities are the following attributes:

1. Situated on the Narrabeen Sandstone plateaux across the Blue Mountains region
2. Underlying sandstone, ironstone and claystone bedrock forming a horizontal impermeable layer
3. Ancient peaty sandy soil with organic matter that is poorly drained
4. Presence of groundwater
5. Constantly or intermediately waterlogged soil
6. Locally native vegetation that thrives in such waterlogged soils

.

Q:  But where do the spatial limits of a Blue Mountains Swamp begin and end?  Are Blue Mountains Swamps dependent upon the health of adjoining vegetation communities, particularly of those upstream.

A:  Probably, but who knows and who is researching Blue Mountains Swamps?

Q:  Is it the physical characteristics that differentiate a Blue Mountains Swamp from other less significant vegetation communities or is it our selective attitudes that decide whether to protect it or condemn it?

God Government Death Lever

.

A Save or Bulldoze Case Study:  

‘Katoomba Creek Swamp at Twynam Street’

.

Katoomba Creek Swamp

Katoomba Creek in the Upper Central Blue Mountains flows northward from a central plateau into the Grose Valley within the Blue Mountains National Park.

Katoomba Creek Swamp

.

The headwaters of Katoomba Creek are forked from four upland gullies, one which has been dammed for water reservoir (Cascade Reservoir), and another starts near Twynam Street which forms the outer settlement area of Katoomba.  It is just three kilometres upstream from the World Heritage Area – the boundary of which is rather arbitrary and should be here at the precious headwaters.

Yet despite the substrate and vegetation characteristics of the creek headwaters suiting those of a Blue Mountains Swamp, Blue Mountains Council’s chief housing development manager, Paul Weston, Executive Principal, Building & Construction Services on 13th February 2012 deemed that “the vegetation community across the site is consistent with the Eucalyptus oreades Open Forest community, and known variations of that community, and is not a hanging swamp.”

“The inspections confirmed that some basic features common to hanging swamps are present on the land, such as steep slopes and groundwater seepage which supports the occurrence of the fern species Pouched Coral Fern (Gleichenia dicarpa), which is also found in swamps.  However, the absence of many typical Blue Mountains Swamp species, the presence of a prominent tree canopy, the absence of peat formation and the co-existence of the ferns with established and emerging sclerophyll shrub species, make this community inconsistent with that of the Blue Mountains Swamp Community.”

Furthermore, while the sheltered south easterly aspect, steep slope, the underlying geology and locally moist conditions provide a niche within the forested E. oreades- E. radiata – E. piperita community for ferns and other species to flourish in the wet conditions, the area does not support the usual suite of Blue Mountains swamp sedges, ground layer and shrub vegetation, nor the development of peat, nor is it wet enough to prevent the co-existence of other drier sclerophyll forest understory and canopy species in this vicinity.

The Proposed Housing Development Site at 121 Twynam Street Katoomba

.

Blue Mountains Council’s Environmental Scientist and Environmental/Landscape Assessment Officer have inspected and assessed this swamp and deemed it not a swamp but a ‘wet forest‘.

Ed:  What puritanical pretense!

.

This pristine vegetation community lies wholly within the riparian zone of the headwaters of Katoomba Creek (just metres away from the above photo).  The underlying substrate is sandstone, ironstone and claystone bedrock forming a horizontal impermeable layer.  The soil is ancient peaty sandy soil with organic matter that is poorly drained.  It has constant groundwater causing waterlogged soil.  The vegetation is a carpet of Pouched Coral Ferns, with a large cluster of King Ferns.  It has Soft Twig Rush (Baumea rubiginosa), its Lepidosperma limicola (sedge grass in foreground).    The tree canopy is Eucalyptus oreades which is common across Blue Mountains Swamps found at creek headwaters, but endemic only around Katoomba.

Is this more Swamp Selective Bias?

Indeed, the Blue Mountains Council ecological mapping assigned this site as a dry sclerophyll  Eucalyptus piperita/ Eucalyptus sieberi forest.  Woops.

The Council judgment letter stated that this site is zoned under Local Environmental Plan (LEP) 1991 as Residential Bushland Conservation.  But in fact, 80% of the site is zoned as a ‘Protected Area – Environmental Constraint‘  (see below extract).  Woops.

.

.

LEP 1991 Protected Areas Objectives:   Clause 7.2 Environmental Constraint Area

.

(a) To protect environmentally sensitive land and areas of high scenic value in the City  (Ed: not that any reasonable person could possibly deem the Blue Mountains to be a ‘city’).
(b) To provide a buffer around areas of ecological significance.  (Ed: Such as a pristine Blue Mountains Swamp)
(c) To restrict development on land that is inappropriate by reason of its physical characteristics or bushfire risk.  (Ed: the site is Bushfire Risk Category 1)

.

121 Twynam Street is zoned a Category 1 Bushfire Risk

.

The Slope of the site exceeds 33% grade, which exceeds the limits for the Council’s development criteria

.

LEP 1991 Clause 11.3  ‘Environmental Constraint Area’

.

“The Council shall not consent to development in a Protected Area – Environmental Constraint Area, unless it is satisfied, by means of a detailed environmental assessment, that the development complies with the objectives of the Protected Area that are relevant to the development and will comply with the Development Criteria in clause 10 that are relevant to the development.”

Council Judgment:

.

 “In conclusion it is considered that the proposed dwelling and driveway have been designed and located to ensure that the development will not have a significant adverse environmental impact and is suitable for the site.”

.

.

Ed:  So is this judgment and the process one of selective blindness, ignoring rules, hypocrisy, incompetence, or worse?   In the case of Katoomba Creek Swamp, the decision is not to save this particular Blue Mountains Swamp, but to bulldoze it.

.

Road dozing into the spectacular forests of the Esperance, Southern Tasmania

.

First, a Gunns postmortem:

.

To all but the exploitation deniers, the demise of industrial logger Gunns this week was a fait accompli about a case of insular management obstinately pursuing an unsustainable business model.

Gunns plans for industrial deforestation have deservedly been condemned to civilised obsolescence like the Atlantic Slave Trade and the Fur Trade before it.

The industrial culture of taming Nature as if Man needed to compete

.

Gunns employees, contractors, suppliers, investors and lenders have all been in denial – ‘market denial‘ – a story of  “corporate arrogance, complacency, denial and hubris“.

And the Tasmanian and Australian parliaments have been equally negligent in delaying the implementation of their 2011 ^Tasmanian Forests Intergovernmental Agreement to transition Tasmanians out of this dying native timber industry, as well as shunning their broader social responsibilities to dependent communities.

Gunns Pulp Mill Site

.

They have allowed the problem to fester and to escalate.  So now the inevitable crash has been all the more severe for all involved.   This is a classic failure of leadership and of a parochial culture locked in 20th Century exploitism and despondently lost trying to find sustainable profit in a more complex and very different 21st Century.

.

A puppet passing the buck

.

‘The story of Gunns is a parable of corporate hubris. You can, as they did, corrupt the polity, cow the media, poison public life and seek to persecute those who disagree with you. You can rape the land, exterminate protected species, exploit your workers and you can even poison your neighbours. But the naked pursuit of greed at all costs will in the end destroy your public legitimacy and thus ensure your doom. Gunns was a rogue corporation and its death was a chronicle long ago foretold. The sadness is in the legacy they leave to Tasmania—the immense damage to its people, its wildlands, and its economy.’

.

Denial Domino Effect…Ta Ann

.

Ta Ann Tasmania now remains the major driver of logging operations that continue to destroy large areas of old growth and high conservation value forests in Tasmania.  Ta Ann Holdings is a Malaysian-based multinational logging and timber products company.

The Ta Ann Group has a track record of rainforest destruction and human rights violations in the Malaysian state of Sarawak.

The Ta Ann Group’s operations began in 1985 when a subsidiary was granted a 257,604 acre concession to extract timber in the Kapit District, in the Malaysian state of Sarawak.  In recent years the conglomerate has grown substantially to be among the top five timber groups in Sarawak. The Ta Ann Group includes many subsidiaries and is worth around $US1.6billion.

The principal activities of the Ta Ann Group are in oil palm, timber concession licenses, trading logs, and manufacturing as well as the sale of sawn timber and plywood products. Japan and Europe are the main markets for structural plywood and floor base boards produced by the company.

In January 2006, Ta Ann was welcomed to Australia’s island state of Tasmania with a golden political handshake and they have since established forestry operations to sell Tasmanian wood products to customers in Japan, China and Europe.

Ta Ann’s decision to commence operations in Tasmania was likely driven by two core objectives: they were offered hardwood by the state-owned forestry company, Forestry Tasmania, at lower rates than they could access in Malaysia or Indonesia and they needed Tasmania’s ‘clean, green’ brand to access an increasingly environmentally concerned and lucrative international market.

Ta Ann received timber from Old Growth Coupe HA045E

.

Ta Ann Tasmania has rejected timber from plantations, staked its future on continued access to timber from native forests and has actively lobbied to stall an industry-wide transition to plantation harvesting. Ta Ann has received timber from the destruction of Tasmania’s world class forests, including timber from old growth forests, forests with recognised World Heritage values, threatened species habitat and other forests that are of high conservation value.

.

Jenny Weber

.

Malaysian-owned Ta Ann does not process old growth but accepts wood from forest coupes where some old growth, or forest regarded by green groups as of high conservation value, may be harvested.  This has led conservation groups to attack Ta Ann’s two Tasmanian mills as the main “driver” of the destruction of many of Tasmania’s oldest and most environmentally significant forests.

Huon Valley Environment Centre (HVEC) and Markets for Change have pursued their advocacy campaign for the protection of high conservation value forests and a rapid transition out of native forests in Tasmania.   This has included actually travelling to Japan to Ta Ann’s Japanese markets.  They have exposed Ta Ann’s false claims of using only plantation timber.   They have exposed Ta Ann’s sourcing of timber from high conservation value forests, accused Ta Ann of lying to their Japanese markets about timber certification, and directly lobbied Ta Ann’s Japanese customers to tear up their contracts with Ta Ann and instead seek timber supply that meets high environmental standards, that which the current industry in Tasmania does not meet.

‘Ta Ann’s veneer of truth‘

.

So when it was discovered this week that The Wilderness Society (TWS) and Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) on 20th August 2012 had unilaterally written a letter to the Japanese customers to ask these customers to continue to purchase timber from Ta Ann Tasmania, naturally HVEC and Markets for Change were appalled.  The letter by ACF’s Don Henry and TWS Inc.’s Lyndon Schneiders requests the Japanese customers to continue to purchase the contentious wood supply that Ta Ann Tasmania is supplying.

TWS and ACF are accused of selling out Tasmania’s native forests by secretly undermining the market campaigns of fellow conservationists in Japan and Australia.  TWS and ACF are accused of “treachery” and “betrayal”.

.

Markets for Change and the Huon Valley Environment Centre yesterday expressed shock and dismay at the letter, accusing ACF and TWS of secretly undermining their campaigns, which had been blamed for some cancelled contracts.

“This is an act of treachery to the forests,” Markets for Change campaigner and former Tasmanian Greens leader Peg Putt told The Australian.  “TWS and ACF never had the decency to inform us that they had done this.”

Huon Valley Environment Centre campaigner Jenny Weber said the letter, sent to Ta Ann customers on August 20, seriously undermined campaigning in Japan against the veneer maker.

“It’s unprecedented that TWS and ACF are prepared to support the forest industry and undermine not only our own campaign but that of Japanese campaigners,” Ms Weber said.

“We have felt that these organisations have worked against us in the Japanese markets, and worse still they have supported a forestry industry that is not yet sustainable, committed to a transition out of native forests, and continues to log world heritage value and high conservation value forests. A forestry industry where the biggest timber company is a Malaysian  logging company with a record of displacing indigenous people and environmental desecration in their home state of Sarawak.

.

.

TWS/ACF’s appeasement tactic.

.

The letter states; “As a buyer of Tasmania forests products we continue to respectfully request that you not make any decisions that could adversely affect Tasmanian suppliers during the current negotiations that are now closer to achieving a sustainable future for the forest industries in Tasmania. Far from giving peace a chance, the letters have reduced pressure for the forestry industry to come to an agreement. There is still no final forest agreement in Tasmania and the outlook is bleak as forestry industry representatives have now suspended their participation in the talks,” Ms Weber continued.

“At best the ACF TWS letters are grossly misguided, at worst they are a capitulation to industry. In either case these peak bodies have shown they are willing to support the forestry industry and deliberately undermine our campaign in secret. They have endorsed the ongoing logging of high conservation value forests for Ta Ann and their Japanese customers by  making this communication with the markets.”

“This is not a time for these environment groups to lose their way and become the green tick for an unsustainable native forest logging industry in Tasmania. This is one step too far for these groups who have been waylaid by a long drawn out process that has not delivered any conservation gains and these conservation groups are endorsing the very company that  contributes to the devastation of the forests for which they are trying to secure protection,” Ms Weber concluded.

.

>Read TWS/ACF letter of appeasement

.

.

“This act is undermining the chances of achieving protection of magnificent forests in Tasmania, and also the campaigns of Tasmanian, Australian and Japanese groups who have been participating in a successful markets campaign for the past twelve months”, said Peg Putt of Markets for Change.

Markets for Change spokeswoman Peg Putt

.

“We have consistently asked companies receiving Ta Ann product to call for an immediate stop to logging the conservation claim in Tasmania whilst negotiations over the future protection of these forests take place, and to refuse to take wood product coming from inside this area.

“The ACF and TWS letters are clearly designed to counteract this campaign and to appease the forest industry. They repeatedly express concern for “a sustainable future for the forest industries in Tasmania”, but not for the fate of the magnificent forests under the chainsaw. We do not believe that their members and supporters are aware of or would condone their actions” Ms Putt said.

“The Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) and The Wilderness Society Inc. (TWS Inc) have sent false confidence to the Japanese customers of Ta Ann. This miscommunication in the markets will increase uncertainty. The fact remains that Ta Ann is shipping high conservation value forests to Japan, and these environment groups have endorsed this controversial product in the international market,” said Jenny Weber of the Huon Valley Environment Centre.

.

.

Read:   ^Markets for Change and HVEC protest letter of 20120925.pdf

.

Lessons from Planet Ark’s appeasement tactic

.

No organisation is so big that it cannot fail.  It is recent logging industry appeasement that since last month has seen Planet Ark lose its environmental credibility with many.

Planet Ark was formed in 1992 and is well known for having established ‘National Tree Day’ across Australia – ‘Australia’s largest community nature event’.  Planet Ark claims to be “an environmental organisation committed to encouraging positive behaviour change… We guard our independence and reputation fiercely.” ~ Planet Ark.

Yet just last month (August 2012) Sydney-based environmental not-for-profit organisation, Planet Ark, has been found out allowing its Planet Ark logo to be used on advertisements for timber, paid for by Forest and Wood Products Australia (FWPA). It is part of a sponsorship deal in which Planet Ark gets $700,000 from the timber industry.  The deal involves Planet Ark’s public endorsement in the ‘Make It Wood’ advertising campaign which promotes the increased use of certified, responsibly sourced wood as a building material, along with the organisation’s decision to join the timber industry’s certification system for wood products, called the Australian Forestry Standard (AFS).

Yet the AFS Scheme has been found to have allowed timber to be sourced from high conservation value native forests. A timber company ticked off by the AFS was last year fined for illegal logging.  AFS board member, the Victorian Government’s industrial logger, VicForests, was fined more than $200,000 by the Victorian Government’s Department of Sustainability and Environment for logging over allocation.  ViCforests has also lost a Supreme Court case for planning to log threatened species habitat in East Gippsland and is being taken to court this year over alleged rainforest logging.

Australian environmental groups claim that the AFS Scheme is dodgy and approves “the most appalling logging practices like we see in Indonesia and Malaysia. AFS is endorsed by the Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification (PEFC), which has also been condemned globally for endorsing the certification of forest operations that destroy biodiversity, revoke human and community rights, and fail to undertake adequate engagement with key stakeholders.”

Reflex (copy paper) lost its Forestry Standard Certification by using native forest timber supplied by VicForests, yet retains AFS certification.  The Tasmanian Government’s industroial logger, Forestry Tasmania, had its AFS certification renewed in July 2012, despite its ongoing clearfelling of high conservation forests and scorched earth practices that permanently destroy forest ecology and replace it with plantation timber, which it then calls ‘sustainable timber’.

.

So Planet Ark is not in good company.  Planet Ark’s endorsement of AFS would seem to be contrary to Planet Ark’s key objective – ‘to protect and enhance the natural environment‘.  It would be interesting to learn how FWPA answered Pkanet Ark’s Prospective Partners Questionnaire question #6:

.

‘What is the environmental advantage and rationale/justification for this partnership?‘

.

Conservationists have accused Planet Ark of having gone over to the ‘darkside’.

Sarah Rees from My Environment has said, “What in effect Planet Ark is doing today is endorsing logging in the Styx Valley (South West Tasmania). This is a very confusing message for consumers, given Planet Ark has such an important role to play in advising people on best brands and good wood.”

Greens Leader Christine Milne agrees.  “What Planet Ark has done is they have undermined the rest of the environment movement by effectively trying to give some green wash to the native forest logging industry,” she said.  “The AFS has no credibility at all. It was only dreamt up in response to the FSC standard and Australia couldn’t meet that standard. Next thing we knew we had this dodgy standard which no-one has any respect for.”

Independent Senator Nick Xenophon says Planet Ark’s deal with the timber industry is a conflict of interest. “There could be a perception that who pays the piper calls the tune. And when you’re getting $700,000 in donations from the industry and part of the review of the forest standard, then it raises some serious questions of a potential conflict of interest,” he said.

“The AFS scheme concerns many environmentalists.  Clear felling, environmental destruction, death of native forests,”  said environmentalist Jon Dee who helped found Planet Ark twenty years ago.  “We believe this campaign, tied up with the forest industry, is one step too far.”

Joint founding member, Australia’s tennis great, Pat Cash, issued a statement to ABC TV’s 7.30 programme stated:

“The deal with the forest industry and the controversy around the Peter Maddison TV advert has eroded Planet Ark’s credibility as an environmental organisation.  The Planet Ark board and management team should be held accountable for this decision to work with the forest industry…Planet Ark needs to return to the values that once made it such a great organisation and withdraw from their association with the AFS and the FWPA.”

.

The Director of environment group My Environment, Sarah Rees, says these are confronting issues for big NGOs who traditionally don’t come out against each other.  “Discussions with Planet Ark with organisations including the Wilderness Society and Greenpeace over 14 months have failed to get Planet Ark to amend its attitude to the issues of clear-fell logging.

.

“Planet Ark has dug its heels in with its message that all wood is good wood and this is just not right. The role of the environmental organisations is to ethically educate the public on forestry issues but Planet Ark has muddied that message.”

~ Sarah Rees (August 2012)

.

.

The Australian Forestry Standard provides certification for logging in extensive areas of native forests across Australia, and for wood products arising from such logging.

Watch the new promotional video ‘The Facts’ right now to see what sort of assurance the standard provides to retail customers and the Australian consumer about the forest and wood products they are purchasing.

[Source:  ^http://australianforestrystandard.com/]

.

19th Century heritage-listed ‘Six Foot Track’

.
It has been revealed that the June bulldozing or grading of the Six Foot Track near Megalong Creek (Blue Mountains, New South Wales) was a mere drop in the Rural Fire Service (RFS) Bushfire Mitigation Programme.

Across the Blue Mountains, some twenty natural reserves including the Six Foot Track were targeted under the RFS 2004-05 Fire Trail Strategy:

• Edith Falls
• McMahons Point
• Back Creek
• Cripple Creek
• Plus some 95 hectares inside the Blue Mountains National Park.

.

Read: [>RFS Fire Trail Policy]

Read: [>RFS Fire Trail Classification Guidelines]

.

According to the Australian Government’s (then) Department of Transport and Regional Services (DOTARS) website, some $151,195 was granted to the RFS in the Blue Mountains alone, for it to bulldoze and burn 144 hectares of native bushland under the euphemism of “addressing bushfire mitigation risk priorities”  (Ed: Read ‘bush arson‘) 

‘The Six Foot Track Conservation and Management Plan 1997, Vol II’ lists numerous vulnerable species of fauna recorded near Megalong Creek – the Glossy Black-Cockatoo (Clyptorhynchus lathami), Giant Burrowing Frog (Heleioporus australiacus), Spotted-tailed Quoll (Dasyurus maculatus).

Glossy Black-Cockatoo

.

Giant Burrowing Frog

.

Spotted-tailed Quoll

.

The RFS contractors wouldn’t have had a clue if they were within 100 metres or 1 metre of rare, vulnerable or threatened species.

The RFS is not exempt from destroying important ecological habitat; rather it is required to have regard to the principles of Ecologically Sustainable Development (ESD).

Read: >RFS Policy 2-03 Ecologically Sustainable Development

.

The ‘Rationale‘ of this RFS ESD policy states at Clause 1.2:

‘The Bush Fire Coordinating Committee, under the Rural Fires Act 1997 Sec 3 (d), is required to have regard to ESD as outlined in the Protection of the Environment Administration Act 1991, which sets out the following principles:

a)   The precautionary principle namely, that if there are threats of serious or irreversible environmental damage, lack of full scientific certainty should not be used as a reason for postponing measures to prevent environmental degradation. In the application of the precautionary principle, public and private decisions should be guided by:

i.   careful evaluation to avoid, wherever practicable, serious or irreversible damage to the environment, and
ii.   an assessment of the risk-weighted consequences of various options.

.

b)   Inter-generational equity namely, that the present generation should ensure that the health, diversity and productivity of the environment are maintained or enhanced for the benefit of future generations

.

.

c)   Conservation of biological diversity and ecological integrity should be a fundamental consideration in all decisions.

.

d)   Recognising the economic values that the natural environment provides. The natural environment has values that are often hard to quantify but provide a benefit to the entire community. By recognising that the natural environment does have significant economic and social values we can improve decision making for the present and future generations.’

.

.

Yet the RFS policy on hazard reduction is woefully loose in the ‘Bushfire Co-ordinating Committee Policy 2 /03 on ESD‘ – which (on paper) advocates protecting environmental values and ensuring that ESD commitments are adopted and adhered to by contractors.

Experience now confirms this policy is nothing more than ‘greenwashing’.  The RFS wouldn’t know what environmental values were if they drove their fire truck into a Blkue Mountains upland swamp.  There is not one ecologist among them.

While the critical value of dedicated RFS volunteer fire-fighters fighting fires is without question, what deserves questioning is the unsustainable response of the RFS ‘old guard’ to fire trails and hazard reduction with token regard for sensitive habitat.  Repeated bushfire research confirms that bushfires are mostly now caused by:

1. Bush arson (hazard reduction included, escaped or otherwise)
2. More residential communities encroaching upon bushland.

.

Under the ‘Blue Mountains Bushfire Management Committee Bushfire Risk Management Plan’ (Ed: their bureaucratic name), key objectives are patently ignored:

• ‘Ensure that public and private land owners and occupiers understand their bushfire management responsibilities’
• ‘Ensure that the community is well informed about bushfire protection measures and prepared for bushfire events through Community Fireguard programs’
• ‘Manage bushfires for the protection and conservation of the natural, cultural, scenic and recreational features , including tourism values, of the area’.

.

Instead, the Rural Fire Service is content to look busy by burning and bulldozing native bushland.  The RFS actively demonises native vegetation as a ‘fuel hazard‘, in the much the same way that ignorant colonists of the 18th and 19th centuries demonised Australia’s unique wildlife as ‘vermin‘ and ‘game‘.

.

Further Reading:

.

.

What these government funded and State-sanctioned bush-arsonists get up to, deliberately setting fire to wildlife habitat, is an ecological disgrace.

The following list is from just 2005 of the vast areas of native vegetation deliberately burnt across New South Wales in just this one year.  [Source: DOTARS].

Not surprisingly, this State-sanctioned bush-arson information is no longer published by government each year for obvious clandestine reasons, as the bush-arson continues out of the public eye.

The hazard reduction cult is similarly perpetuated across other Australian states – Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, West Australia as well as Northern Territory and the ACT.   No wonder Australia’s record of wildlife extinctions tragically leads the world!  There is little precious rich wildlife habitat left.

.

National Park and Wildlife Service  (NSW) Bush Arson:

(Note: ‘NR’ = Nature Reserve, ‘NP’ = National Park, ‘SCA’ = State Conservation Area… as if these bastards care)

i.e.  An area 6km x 6km

.

NSW Local Government Areas (LGAs)

i.e.   An area 20km x 20km

.

Forests NSW (government’s industrial logger of NSW remnant forests).

(Forests NSW did not publish the area burnt, only the cost. As a rule of thumb use $3000/square km)

i.e.  Approximately an area 20km x 20km

 .

NSW Department of Lands    (what native vegetation’s left).

i.e.  Approximately an area 24km x 24km

. .

One of the few remaining clusters of mature Blue Mountains Ash (Eucalytus oreades)

.

What a steaming crock Blue Mountains Council’s (BMCC) Significant Tree Register is!

The 73 listed trees or listed tree communities on BMCC’s register listed as ‘significant‘ means exactly what?   ‘BMCC significant’ is a lying euphemism for ‘big‘ and ‘expendable‘, confirmed by the fact that every time anyone wants to kill one of the listed trees, they can.

The ‘Register‘ should be renamed a ‘Remnant‘, reflecting the reducing remnancy of the Blue Mountains forests under the control of BMCC.

And many trees on the Register are indeed exotic, if not weeds.  For instance, listed tree #3 is an exotic Rhododendron, #18 is an exotic cherry tree,  #28 is a Radiata Pine – a listed environmental weed in another department of BMCC.

BMCC’s Significant Tree Register?

.

BMCC’s Significant Tree Register dates back to 1988,  probably because of Australia’s bicentennial heritage goodwill of that year, and the likelihood of BMCC getting grant recognition for its register.  That would have been a purely political froth event of no substance nor perpetuity.

‘This Development Control Plan has been prepared pursuant to Council’s resolution of 17th November, 1987 and was adopted on 21st June, 1988. The Plan encompasses the Register of Significant Trees, established in 1984. (BMCC File 7717C-4)…This Development Control Plan is to apply to all land within the boundaries of the City of the Blue Mountains.’

.

Objectives of Significant Tree Register

.
The purpose of this Development Control Plan is to:

(a)   identify and protect those trees listed on the Register;

(b)   promote greater public awareness of the existence of the Register, and the individual items listed;

(c)   ensure existing and, importantly, prospective land owners, are made aware of the Significant Trees which may be located on their property; and

(d)   ensure correct on-going care and maintenance of those trees listed, through the recommendations included with the significant tree register.’

What disingenuous lying crap!

(a) None of the listed trees is afforded any legal protection.  Worse, BMCC does not raise a finger to expend effort or cost to challenge anyone wishing to kill any of the listed trees.

(b) Since 1988, BMCC has done diddly squat to promote any public awareness of either its register or any of its listed trees.  Yet, BMCC certainly has killed a few of them.  The last time a tree was added to the register was 1991, reflecting the three year extent of Council’s interest, memory and planning,

(c) see (a)

(d) I challenge BMCC to present any record of any “on-going care and maintenance of those trees listed”.  Obviously this object clause was drafted by a naive external consultant.

.

Listed Trees – Cases in Point

.

#5  Blue Mountains Ash 

.

#29  Smooth Barked Apple, Red Gum 

.

New South Wales Government sentence imposed upon this Angophora:

.

“The Angophora (Sydney red gum) tree:   the large tree is situated to the east of Boronia Road.

To retain the Angophora tree the highway would have to be widened either towards the railway line or the private properties.  In both cases, land would have to be acquired, either from RailCorp or private land owners.  The tree’s overhanging branches would have to be trimmed and there would be construction activities around the tree.

Arborist advice is that the consequent loss of tree roots and the pruning would instigate the decline of the tree.  Angophora are highly sensitive to construction impacts such as changes to draining patterns and soil compaction.  For road construction and safety reasons the tree will have to be removed.”

.

Ed:  Well, humans can find ways of justifying anything when it suits them – ecological destruction, genocide, wars, anything.  Governments and road making organisations like the RTA are collectives of people with mandates that are self-serving. 

The RTA (since rebranded) does not have to widen the highway through Bullaburra.  It is only doing so to encourage greater truck and car traffic and so that such road traffic can flow faster.  Bigger and more roads is the mandate for this road maker.  The tradition of slowing down through local towns and villages has been dismissed.  Utilitarian convenience is supplanting local rights and values.  Other options have been deliberately ignored such as upgrading rail freight logistics and public transport (the rail runs adjacent to and follows the same route as this highway).  Land acquistion is an easy process for the RTA.  It’s management is just choosing not to take this option because it sees no value in the tree nor in Bullaburra’s amenity.

The tree’s overhanging branches would not have to be trimmed and construction activities could be well away from the tree, if the RTA management so choosed.

The RTA’s standard justification “safety reasons” had to be the clincher.  the RTA relies on the ‘safety justification’ as its fallback to get its way, because it has convinced that no-one can reasonably challenge such a justification.  That the M4 Motorway with its six lanes has become one of the most deadly RTA roads in New South Wales does not seem to trouble the RTA sufficiently to invest in making the M4 safer.  The RTA is hypocritical about road safety.

The value of encouraging faster and bigger trucks and more cars to race through Bullaburra at 80+kph is more important to it than conserving some tree.   That this particular tree has been dated by a specialist arborist as being older than300 years and so would have stood when the Three Explorers first crossed the Blue Mountains in 1813, is dismissed as worthless by the RTA and the New South Wales Government.   Labor and Liberal are no different in this world view of ‘progress’.  Bullaburra is set to be transformed into a Blaxland with bigger trucks racing through it.  Bullaburra will become even more divided that what it is now. 

If this tree were a war cemetery, there is no question that the cemetery value would be respected and a trucking expressway would not be carved through it.

.

Les Wielinga

.

#33 Scribbly Gum 

.

Blue Mountains Council arborist has condemned the tree as having ‘extensive decay’.

.

Trial by Ordeal?

.

Local residents protesting to save the tree, believe this native Scribbly Gum to be quite healthy and that the arborist’s so-called ‘decay‘ is in fact a natural fungus.  The residents believe that Council’s arborist’s assessment has incorrectly condemned the tree and that only after the tree trunk is chainsawed will the proof of the tree’s health be revealed.

It will be akin to being a Medieval Trial by Ordeal imposed on those suspected of being a witch.   An example is where a priest would demand a suspect to place his hand in the boiling water. If after three days, God had not healed his wounds, the suspect was guilty of the crime.

In the case of this Scribbly Gum, if after chainsawing it, the trunk shows no signs of internal decay, then it can be confirmed as having being healthy, but by then it will be dead.

.

The Council’s assessment:

“It should also be noted that the significant tree has been assessed as not being viable for retention in any case as the result of extensive decay throughout the trunk. This matter is discussed in more detail in the body of the report.”

.

#61 Blue Mountains Ash
(Eucalyptus oreades – once was a ridgetop forest)
(Railway Reserve opposite Katoomba Hospital, Listed 6.11.89,

.

Relevance and future of the Significant Tree Register

.

In November 2011, Blue Mountains Councillor Janet Mays presented a Notice of Motion to Council:

.

“That the Council receives a report detailing the role and relevance of Council’s Significant Tree Register, including the cost of both managing and maintaining that Register.”

Background

The recent decision by the Land & Environment Court, to uphold an appeal by the applicants at 47 St Georges Crescent, Faulconbridge, includes permission to remove a tree that is listed on Council’s Significant Tree Register that decision brings into question the relevance of this Register.

The report should outline the role and relevance of the Register in providing decision-making capability to Council’s Planning Officers. The role and relevance of the Register should then be considered in terms of benefits and cost of maintaining this Register.  Dependant on the benefits and the costs, the future utility of the Register should also be discussed.”

Ed:  Meanwhile, anthropocentric prejudice sees the National Trust of Australia (an organisation supposedly committed to promoting and conserving Australia’s indigenous, natural and historic heritage) recognise people as ‘National Living Treasures’.  No thought is given to Australian native trees, many which have stood longer than any colonist set foot on Australian soil.   Surely, a 300+ year old native tree has more claim to being a national living treasure.

On 4 March 2012, two days ago, we hear that Queensland mining magnate Clive Palmer has been named a National Living Treasure.  Palmer has made is fortune exploiting Australia’s landscape for his personal gain.  Clearly, Australian Governments continued to be dominated by 20th Century Baby Boomer exploitative world views. 

.

Further Reading

.

.

Since 12^thMay 2005, Blue Mountains Swamps have been listed as an endangered ecological community under the Environmental Protection Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999, (EPBC Act), as amended in 2005.  Blue Mountains Swamps are listed under the scientific category of Temperate Highland Peat Swamps on Sandstone.

The objectives of the EPBC Act include providing for the protection of the environment, especially matters of national environmental significance and to conserve Australian biodiversity.  In the case of Blue Mountains Swamps, the EPBC Act serves to prevent the actions of land use developers and others posing a significant impact upon the integrity of these vital swamp ecosystems.

A Blue Mountains Swamp

.

The steel fence of the development is built right into the Blue Mountains Swamp

.

This housing development was approved by Blue Mountains Council.

At the same time, Blue Mountains Council’s Upland Swamp Rehabilitation Programme was commenced in 2006 after Blue Mountains Swamps were listed as part of the Temperate Highland Peat Swamps on Sandstone endangered ecological community, with the aim of protecting and restoring Blue Mountains Swamp across the Local Government Area (LGA).

“In August 2008 Blue Mountains Council and Lithgow Council formed a partnership to deliver the ‘Saving our Swamps’ (S.O.S) project to restore Temperate Highland Peat Swamps on Sandstone across both LGAs. With grant funding of $250,000 over 3 years from the Urban Sustainability program of the NSW Environmental Trust, the SOS project will both strengthen Blue Mountains Council’s long term Upland Swamp Rehabilitation Programme and transfer skills to build the capacity of Lithgow Council to protect the Newnes Plateau Shrub Swamp endangered ecological community of the Newnes Plateau.”

Local community volunteers helping Blue Mountains Council

.

“The SOS initiative will build on the Blue Mountains Council’s Upland Swamp Rehabilitation Programme, by providing funds for bush regeneration, soft engineering swamp re-hydration and creek bank stabilization in degraded Blue Mountains Swamps on both public and private land. The project will also deliver a community and school education program to raise awareness of the significance of Blue Mountains Swamps and their associated threatened species and to explain how the community can assist in their protection.

The successful partnership between BMCC and LCC was expanded in 2009 to incorporate Wingecarribee Shire Council and Gosford Council. The resultant SOS stage 2 project received a $400,000 federal Caring for Country grant over 12 months to expand the model across all four LGAS under the leadership of Blue Mountains Council.”

.

Am I missing something here?

Blue Mountains Council receiving $250,000 plus $400,000

to save Blue Mountains Swamps,

while approving development into them?

Saving Our Swamps by Council-approved slashing, bulldozing and reclamation

Location of Fifth Avenue adjacent to Blue Mountain National Park (BMNP)

.

“This park, which is part of the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area, protects an unusually diverse range of vegetation communities. There are rare and ancient plants and isolated animal populations tucked away in its deep gorges.” 

.

The site of Blue Mountains Significant Tree #5 – it was a massive Eucalyptus oreades

.

This mature native tree was respected enough to have been listed on Blue Mountain Council’s Significant Tree Register.  Indeed it was the 5th such listed tree on Blue Mountains Council’s Register of Significant Trees back in 1988.

So what is the meaning of a ‘Significant Tree‘ on Blue Mountains Council’s register?

Well back on 21st June 1988 the Register of Significant Trees was adopted by Blue Mountains Council as an integral part of its Development Control Plan, which proclaimed significant trees be protected under Clause 6 ‘Protection of Items Listed in the Register of Significant Trees‘ so that:

.

‘No person shall ringbark, cut down, top, lop, injure, wilfully destroy or cause damage to the root system off any tree listed on the Register of Significant trees without consent of Council.’

.

Perhaps the current Blue Mountains Council mayor may care to publicly explain why its Significant Tree Number 5, a locally endemic Eucalyptus oreades (Blue Mountains Ash) of some stature located opposite 252 Old Bathurst Road Katoomba (Lot 2 DP707) has been woodchipped into oblivion?

• Was formal Blue Mountains Council consent given to kill it?
• If so, when was this Blue Mountains Council consent given to kill it?
• What Blue Mountains Council documentation is publicly available to validate such consent?
• What public notice was provided by Blue Mountains Council for community consultation about its killing?
• Does Blue Mountains Council give a bleeding toss?

.

The objectives of Blue Mountains Council’s Significant Tree Register include:

.
(a) identify and protect those trees listed on the Register
(b) promote greater public awareness of the existence of the Register, and the individual items listed
(c) ensure existing and, importantly, prospective land owners, are made aware of the Significant Trees which may be located on their property
(d) ensure correct on-going care and maintenance of those trees listed, through the recommendations included with the significant tree register

.

The following tree is not even on the Blue Mountains Council Significant Tree Register, so has even less chance of protection.

Katoomba’s most significant (grandfather) Eucalyptus oreades, beside Megalong Street

.

But this tree is perpetually being subjected by Blue Mountains Council approved industrial development after industrial development – the road widening, the recent expansion of the bus depot across the road and now some ‘mega industrial’ estate behind it.  Blue Mountains Council pro-development forces are mounting against it.

.

The Mega industrial development immediately behind this magnificent native tree

.

The Theo Poulos promoted ‘Mega Industrial Park’

.

But then Blue Mountains Council’s so-called Significant Tree Register has always been a crock of deceptive community greenwashing!

As soon as any tree on its register becomes slightly inconvenient, our pro-development Blue Mountains Council, strangled by Liberal-Labor Party vested interests, easily turns a blind eye to significant Blue Mountain heritage and no more significant tree.

Is it any wonder that as the Blue Mountains is allowed to be developed and its natural amenity destroyed that outsiders no longer see the Blue Mountains as a significant attraction, but more as an extension of Sydney sprawl?  They just speed past on that forever faster, noisier and more dangerous Trucking Expressway!

.

What area of old growth native forest has been saved from business-as-usual deforestation as a result of the United Nation’s declaration of 2011 as the International Year of Forests?

In Tasmania frankly it’s been logging Business-as-Usual 

.

UN International Year of Forests 2011 – ‘Global Objectives‘?

This is (was) the official UN website:  ^http://www.un.org/en/events/iyof2011/

.

Well, at the time of writing, the public relations material on the official UN website conveys a general message that the ‘Forests 2011‘ programme is intended “to strengthen global efforts to improve the state of forests” and draws upon its dedicated subsidiary United Nations Forum on Forests (UNFF), adopting four Global Objectives:

1. Reverse Forest Loss – reverse the loss of forest cover worldwide through sustainable forest management, including protection,restoration, afforestation and reforestation, and increase efforts to prevent forest degradation.
2. Enhance Forest-based Benefits – economic, social and environmental benefits, including by improving the livelihoods of forest-dependent people.
3. Increase Sustainably Managed Forests –  including protected forests, and increase the proportion of forest products derived from sustainably managed forests.
4. Mobilize Financial Resources – reverse the decline in official development assistance for sustainable forest management and mobilise significantly-increased new and additional financial resources from all sources for the implementation of sustainable forest management.

.

.

Sounds encouraging, but where are the stated deliverables?, key result areas?, key performance indicators?, programme targets?, UN budget to achieve these global objectives?  Where is the implementation plan and the delegated implementation task force?

The website is thick on its public relations message, but thin on substance.  In the absence of any mention of the means to achieve these four objectives, my initial reaction is that it is more motherhood and perhaps just about ‘raising awareness‘.  But don’t we already know that deforestation is a critical global problem?

.

The aim of the  UN International Year of Forests 2011 seems to have merely been “to raise awareness and strengthen the sustainable management, conservation and sustainable development of all types of forests for the benefit of current and future generations“.

.

It just sounds like more Forestry spin!

.

And ‘sustainable forest management‘ is a familiar phrase and one bandied about not by environmentalists, but by forestry industry – i.e. industrial loggers. Type ‘sustainable forest management’ in Google at look at the websites results:

• Australian Government Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry  (i.e. derives revenue from logging)
• Australian Forest Education Alliance (AFEA) – includes members from Australian Forest Products Association, Forests NSW, Forest Education Foundation Tasmania, Forest and Wood Products Australia, Primary Industries and Resources South Australia, Forestry Sustainable Forestry Program (Southern Cross University), NSW Forest Products Commission WA, VicForests (i.e. all derive revenue directly from logging, or subsidised by industrial loggers)
• Forestry Tasmania  (i.e. derives revenue from logging)
• Forests NSW  (i.e. derives revenue from logging)
• Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations  (encouraged forest be used for wood production)
• The Institute of Foresters of Australia
• Department of Sustainability and Environment (Victoria)  (encouraged logging and burning of native forests)
• etc.

.

UN International Year of Forests 2011 – ‘Global Achievements‘?

.

The only other information that may be gleaned from the official UN site covers topics such as promotional events, films, photos, collaborative global partner organisations plus some forest statistics, a few online publications but that’s about it.   So today on 30th December 2011 as the International Year for Forests draws to a close, what has the UN programme actually achieved?

What area of the world’s native forests has been protected from otherwise business-as-usual deforestation?  What has stopped Forestry Tasmania and its band of loggers from their business-as-usual holocaust treatment of Tasmania’s endangered ancient native forest ecosystems?

Answer:    More PR funding for the UN’s next programme?

.

Australian Government’s endorsement of International Year of Forests 2011 

.

Rather than convey an assessment here, I shall just quote from the Australian Government’s website dedicated to supporting this programme (before it vanishes):

.

Australia’s Forests

.

‘Australia has some of the most beautiful and productive forest areas in the whole world. These fantastic and magical places mean a lot of different things to different people. Some of us work with the wood from the forests. Some work with the creatures that live in the forests. Some of us live in the forests and some of us play in the forest (camping, hiking, exploring) and some of us just love looking and being in a forest!

‘Without a doubt what ever your use, be it a little or a lot, Australian’s should be proud of Australia’s forests!

‘The United Nations announced 2011 as the International Year of Forests. Australians can unite and celebrate our sustainably managed forests and the diversity that our forests bring to our lives. Our forests give us wood that we use every single day and these very same forests give us the best playground that our kids could ever hope for. Australia’s forests are used by everyone and are the best in the world!

.

Ministers Address

.

‘Australia has about 4 per cent of the world’s forests on 5 per cent of the world’s land area, and has one of the best managed forestry sectors in the world.

‘The nation’s forests, and the products they produce, provide significant employment, environmental and recreational benefits to communities across Australia. Australia’s forestry and wood manufacturing sector employs nearly 76,000 people, many in regional areas, and generates around $7 billion worth of wood and paper products annually.

‘Across the nation the forests in conservation reserves cover over 23 million hectares. These reserves provide recreational benefits for communities and contribute to the 12 billion tonnes of carbon stored by Australian forests. Industry and government have been working hard to make sure our forests remain sustainable and viable for the long-term.

‘The Australian Government recognise the importance of World Forestry Day and the International Year of Forests and has actively supported both initiatives. This year the Gillard Government intends to release legislation to ban the importation of timber products that have not been legally harvested. This law will contribute to global efforts to stop illegal logging, provide for sustainable forest products made in Australia and reduce unfair competition. The Gillard Government remains committed to promoting sustainable forestry initiatives and encourages people to celebrate the International Year of the Forest.’

Senator Joe Ludwig,

Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry

.

And guess who’s embraced the 2011 International Year of Forests with public relations relish?

.

Forestry Tasmania

“Congratulations to Forestry Tasmania (FT) who held a successful Tasmanian launch of International Year of Forests. Held in Hobart on 25 January the ‘forest in the city’ event proved to be a popular summer holiday diversion with a steady stream of families, shoppers and naturalist flowing in to the Melville Street Dome throughout the afternoon.”
.

.

.

‘International Year of Forests 2011 off and running in Tasmania’

..

‘Forestry Tasmania (FT) kicked off its celebrations for the United Nations International Year of Forests 2011 with an open day at the ‘forest in the city’ in its Hobart headquarters on 25 January.   The event proved to be a popular summer holiday diversion, with a steady stream of families, shoppers and naturalists flowing into the Melville Street Dome throughout the afternoon. Their curiosity was rewarded by science and fire fighting displays, indoor abseiling, and even the opportunity for the young (and young at heart) to have their photo taken with ‘Krusty’, FT’s very own giant freshwater crayfish.

Forestry Tasmania’s promotional campaign for the International Year of Forests 2011

.

Forestry Tasmania’s General Manager Corporate Relations and Tourism, Ken Jeffreys, said the open day was just a taste of things to come, with a 12-month calendar of events planned to celebrate the International Year of Forests.

“We have a number of exciting projects scheduled over the next year, such as the opening of new accommodation at Tahune, to be called the AirWalk Lodge.

“This development will, for the first time, see family accommodation available at one of Tasmania’s most highly visited tourism attractions. It will allow our guests to spend a full day experiencing all of the activities on offer at the AirWalk, as well as the many other attractions on offer in the Huon Valley.

“The year will also see a number of high-profile sporting events on state forest, including mountain biking and the multi-sport Ben Lomond Descent.

“And one of our bursary recipients, Shannon Banks, is going to attempt to visit all 52 of our recreation and tourism attractions around the State over the year. She’ll be writing a blog about her adventures, which we hope will inspire Tasmanians to experience the wonders of the forests in their own backyard.”

.

Mr Jeffreys said FT’s staff were excited by the opportunities presented by the International Year of Forests 2011.

“This year, we want to show the community that we are proud of the work we do to ensure the full range of forest values are maintained in perpetuity.  Our staff worked hard to create displays for the launch that were fun and informative. The public’s reception showed us that there is a great deal of interest, and open-mindedness, about the way our forests are managed.”

.

Speech notes Simon Grove (Conservation Biologist with Forestry Tasmania – Division of Forest Research & Development):

.

‘Before I hand over to Rebecca White MHA to officially launch the International Year of Forests, I’ve been asked to say a few words about what our forests mean to the people that work here in Forestry Tasmania. Since our values come from our personal life-experiences, all I can do is tell you my own story, while recognising that every one of us here has their own story too.

I work as a researcher, a conservation biologist, with Forestry Tasmania. In some ways I deal with the meat in the sandwich that is forestry today – what does nature have to say about how we manage – or should manage – the forests in our care?   But I want to start at the beginning. Life is all about discovery, learning and figuring things out, and I was lucky to discover early in life that nature, and forests, can be an excellent source of inspiration and experimentation. So here are a few of my naturalists’ memories, going back to toddlerdom.

I remember:

1. Figuring out that earthworms have bristles that work like legs – if you fill an empty milk-bottle with worms and then leave the milk-bottle in the kitchen, the worms climb out and slither all over the kitchen floor.
2. Learning that if I sat very still in the woods, I could watch the native mice going about their lives – and I could even catch them in my hands – but that they would bite my little sister’s hands if she tried the same thing.
3. Learning that bumblebees loved the nectar of honeysuckle flowers as much as I did – and that they wouldn’t sting if I picked them up to enjoy the sensation of having them buzzing around in my cupped hands – but that they would sting my little sister’s hands if she tried the same thing.
4. Discovering that it wasn’t only nasty wasps that filled the summer air with their droning, but beautiful flower-loving hoverflies – but little sisters aren’t always good at telling them apart.
5. Realising that hungry ground-beetles eat lizards if you keep them in the same cage and don’t feed them.
6. Learning that baby starlings abandoned by their parents get too hot if you try and incubate them on the boiler.
7. Discovering that tadpoles kept in a glass jar don’t turn into frogs unless you give them some land to climb out onto.
8. Realising that flower-presses were designed for delicate plants such as dandelions, and not for cacti.
9. Learning that seashells brought back from the beach get very smelly if they still have their animals in them.
10. Discovering that puffball fungi give off clouds of spores if you wee on them.
11. Discovering that blackbirds’ eggs taste as good as chooks’ eggs if you fry them up on a camping stove in the garden.
12. Figuring out that foxes eat cherries – you can find the stones in their poos.
13. Figuring out that I could make wonderfully whiffy stink-bomb mixture by adding all sorts of sordid ingredients – dog-poo, apple-cores, ink – to the liquid accumulating in the bottom of a tree-hollow; but that if I then added real chemical stink-bomb ingredients to this then I ended up with dead-maggot stew instead.

.

We all have stories like this. (Ed: perhaps only at FT)   In retrospect, we can see that they make us who we are today. Our challenge is to ensure that the next generation is encouraged to explore and experiment too.

I didn’t grow up in Tasmania, but the other side of the world in England. But I don’t think it would have made much difference to my outlook as a child. Nature’s all around us, and children the world over are tuned into it. If it’s nurtured, as it was in me, the empathy for nature can grow. Otherwise it may die away. The presence here today of so many families and children is testament to the amount of nurturing going on around us – which is wonderful to see. And what better place to do so than in our forests.

Some of us are lucky in that as adults we still get to liberate our inner child from time to time – every day if we’re very lucky. That’s how I’ve managed to live my life since leaving school – right through the years of university study; of working with nature conservation organisations in the UK; of working in Uganda as a conservation trainer in the forest department and in Indonesia as a training adviser on an international sustainable forest management project. It’s how I lived my life when I was researching rainforest insects in North Queensland for my PhD. And it’s how I have done so for the past decade as a conservation biologist here at Forestry Tasmania.

And despite what you might expect from media coverage of forestry issues, I don’t feel alone. Many people working in forestry here in Tasmania are naturalists at heart, and many more who wouldn’t call themselves naturalists nevertheless have a deep appreciation for the bush and an understanding of what makes it tick. Not so much sawdust in our veins, as bushdust – an empathy with the forests, and a recognition that we humans are not so much their lords and masters as their stewards.

My brother and I used to call chainsaws ‘long bottoms’, because to my ear they sounded like someone doing a very long fart. Later in my youth I came to see them as the conservationist’s friend, as we went about clearing wildling pines invading the heathland where rare birds nested. Today I know that chainsaws also have more prosaic functions – people use them to harvest trees so that they can be turned into products that we all use, such as timber and paper. This would be a tragic end for the forest if harvest were indeed the end-point. But it’s not, because experience shows that the elements of nature displaced by the harvest begin to move straight back in almost as soon as the chainsaws fall silent, and the forest begins to regrow and to fill with life again.

A background in natural history is good for making connections – among species and among natural processes. We learn that eagles feed on pademelons that graze on grasses and browse on young saplings; eagles nest in the old trees that grew up after the last wildfire and that escaped the browsing of pademelons; fungi and beetles recycle the trees – and even the eagles and pademelons – once they die. Eagles, trees, fungi, pademelons and beetles are all connected. Those of us steeped in natural history and ecology also make connections between humans and the rest of nature. We’re the original environmentalists. We recognise that the world faces not only a GFC but also a GEC – a global environmental crisis. I should emphasise that this crisis is not the outcome of sustainable forestry. But it is the cumulative outcome of all of our growing material demands outstripping the planet’s ability to supply. We all – especially our children – have to deal with the consequences.

In this context, we still expect the world’s remaining forests to be reservoirs of nature and yet to continue to supply our material and spiritual needs. It’s a big ask, but it can be done – certainly so in a place like Tasmania, with all the expertise in forestry and conservation at our disposal.

If I’ve discovered one big theme about the natural world during my life, it is that nature, for all its fragility, is remarkably resilient – think how forests recover after a bushfire. And the main take-home message from the forestry Masters course that I took at Oxford all those years ago, reinforced by daily experience since then, is that forestry is as much about people as it is about trees. Connecting the two concepts I come to a heartening conclusion. Through the increasing value that all of us place on our forests, they look set to become landscapes not of conflict but of reconciliation. Let’s see if we can use this International Year of Forests to further that end.

I’d now like to formally hand over to Rebecca White MHA, so that she can officially launch this International Year of Forests as Forestry Tasmania’s Ambassador.’

.

(Tasmanian) State Labor Member for Lyons and International Year of Forests Ambassador, Rebecca White MP, was on hand to officially launch Forestry Tasmania’s celebrations for 2011. She said the UN’s theme for the year, ‘celebrating forests for people’, had struck a deep chord with her.

“This theme resonated deeply with me, as it conveys the need to manage forests for many values, including conservation and sustainable development.  It means that these values, which are often portrayed as being in conflict, are in fact intertwined.  It also recognises that people are central to the effective management of forests.

.

“While not all values may be delivered in any one area of forest, they are delivered across the entire landscape.  While there are of course a number of challenges confronting the forest industry at present, it’s nonetheless important to remember that our state forests provide skilled employment for thousands of Tasmanians, and indirect employment for many more in our rural and regional communities.

“And of course, our state forests also provide clean drinking water to our towns and cities, they store the equivalent of 24% of Tasmania’s carbon emissions each year, and they provide a host of recreation activities and tourism attractions that appeal to locals and visitors alike.”

Upper Florentine old growth forest clearfelled by Forestry Tasmania in 2009,

.

World Deforestation Clock

.

• Each year about 13 million hectares of the world’s forests are lost due to deforestation, but the rate of net forest loss is slowing down, thanks to new planting and natural expansion of existing forests.
• From 1990 to 2000, the net forest loss was 8.9 million hectares per year.
• From 2000 to 2005, the net forest loss was 7.3 million hectares per year – an area the size of Sierra Leone or Panama and equivalent to 200 km2 per day.
• Primary forests are lost or modified at a rate of 6 million hectares per year through deforestation or selective logging.
• Plantation forests are established at a rate of 2.8 million hectares per year.

.

NOTE:   13,000,000 hectares/year = .412 hectares/sec

See the World Deforestation Clock at http://www.cifor.org/defclock.

.