BY DYLAN FERGUSON
ADELAIDE — Semaphore Beach, one of Adelaide's most popular and least developed beaches, is threatened by a new experiment being implemented by the Coastal Protection Board.
The board intends to mine 164,000 cubic metres of sand from Semaphore Beach to create a breakwater along the coast. If the initial breakwater is successful, it will eventually be changed into a permanent concrete structure.
For over a year, the Port Adelaide Environment Protection Group (PAEPG) has campaigned against sandmining Semaphore Beach.
The justification for the project is to slow the continual build up of sand that, in the last 30 years, has created the Semaphore dune system. It will also slow dune erosion south of Semaphore, where housing is affected.
While this movement of sand is part of a natural coastal cycle, this has been interrupted by coastal development in suburbs south of Semaphore. The eco-system of the coast has been seriously disturbed by the development; the sewerage pumped into the water is killing the seagrass at an alarming rate, and this in turn is contributing to the build up of sand.
While PAEPG recognises that something must be done to address the issue of sand erosion, it opposes the use of sand from the local beaches. The sandmining will destroy a government-funded landcare project which has used $20,000 to revegetate the dunes. Mining will take place over 8-10 weeks, during which the beach, foreshore and local community will be subjected to trucks, machinery and diesel fumes. The resulting erosion will reduce the width of the sand dunes by 50%.
This proposal raises many issues that are relevant for the whole metropolitan coast, not just Semaphore: the problems created from sea-grass die-back, coastal development and housing developments on sand dunes.
The lack of publicly accessible information makes it very difficult to solve such problems. But turning a beach in to a mine with over 6000 truck movements in two months, destroying the last of the metropolitan dunes and undermining public opinion against the sand use is wrong.
If we can't have a say, why did the Coastal Protection Board put so much money into a long drawn-out public consultation process to find out what we thought?
My family have been in Semaphore for three generations, and seen huge changes to the beach throughout that time. The upcoming destruction of the dunes is an insult to the integrity of the local people and to all the tourists who come to Semaphore for its beautiful beach. When will government departments stop making more long-term environmental problems because their budgets are only short-term?
To find out more, phone Stephen Darley from PAEPG on (08) 8242 5121 or email <stoifan@arcom.com.au>.
From Green Left Weekly, June 11, 2003.
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