Concrete seawall approval angers locals
Five Narrabeen home owners have received approval to build a concrete seawall along the beachfront, angering locals.
The seawall will sit behind properties at 1 Clarke Street and 1192, 1194, 1196 and 1204 Pittwater Road, Narrabeen, sitting on either side of Narrabeen Surf Lifesaving Club.
The Northern Beaches Local Planning Panel approved the $2 million seawall on 25 September, with several conditions, including that it must not exceed seven metres in order to minimise the visual impact of the wall.
The project received 178 submissions, with many concerns raised about public access to the beach, visual impact and overshadowing.
Local resident and Surfrider Foundation Northern Beaches president, Brendan Donohoe, said the competency of council needed to be questioned. Mr Donohoe also claimed that the community did not get enough notice of the public consultation.
“This is a public beach. That wall should have been a billboard on Pittwater Road as a proposal,” Mr Donohoe said. “Council has been badly advised and they’ve basically given in to the beachfront property owners.”
Mr Donohoe was one of the 3,000 people who lined the beach in 2002 objecting to a seawall at South Narrabeen, which was later constructed.
“They still went ahead anyway. The objective of the Coastal Management Act is to protect and enhance natural coastal processes, and coastal environmental values, including natural character,” Mr Donohoe said. “This is a carbon producing concrete disgrace that has buggered the beach forever.”
Local coastal engineer Angus Gordon also believes that council has disregarded the Act.
“The active beach zone actually goes into their (private) properties. They’re actually truncating the active beach zone…causing a major problem, which is going to get worse with climate change,” Mr Gordon said. “What’s been done is just absolutely ridiculous. It’s what I term brutalist engineering.”
“This is the wall of shame,” he added.
Mr Gordon said there were other ways the owners could have protected their properties, such as building a rock revetment which is then buried in sand which would retain a more natural beach scene.
Mr Donohoe and Mr Gordon both agreed that the wall would adversely affect public use of the beach and the overall beach amenity.
“There will be sand lost, but there’s going to be more lost over time with climate change. It’s quite simple. This wall is just going to be like a cliff.”