080620 BCR02_EcoAssess_20071109_Final_MT.pdf [As Published] · 132008.1128

3.0       ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECTS MANAGEMENT AND COMPLIANCE

The proposed development is to be located within the development area as illustrated in Figure 1, and
includes four clustered residential aged care apartment buildings (each two storeys) totalling 54
dwellings; a recreation centre; a residential aged care (RAC) facility with 96 beds (two) and 55
independent living unit apartment buildings in seven buildings (each two storeys).

3.1       Impacts

3.1.1     Impacts on Vegetation

The proposed development of the Subject Site will be occurring within the northern area of the site in
accordance with Sunshine Coast Regional Council’s (formerly Noosa Council’s) zoning of the site and
OUM mapping. Vegetation occurring within the development footprint is well represented throughout
other areas of the Subject Site with the exception of the small waterway located within Lot 7,
RP890947; however the proposed development will not utilise this lot and therefore the existing riparian
vegetation will be retained.

Retaining a buffer to the site’s waterway will ensure that the fauna habitat values of the waterway are
retained under the proposed development. The additional benefits of observing a waterway setback
will be to protect the riparian vegetation that currently provides bank stability and reduces
sedimentation and pollution of Burgess Creek downstream of the junction with the site’s waterway.


3.1.2     Impacts on Fauna

Although heavily degraded and infested with weed species, the small waterway continues to provide
suitable habitat for a range of fauna species, including two bird species listed at Rare under
Queensland’s Nature Conservation Act 1992 (Lewin’s Rail and Glossy Black Cockatoo). “Acid frogs”
that are likely to occur in the adjacent Noosa National Park may also infrequently occupy this waterway.
The primary impact of the proposed development will therefore be the potential impacts on, or removal
of, fauna habitat within the waterway in the northern property of the site.

“Edge effects” that may occur as a result of the proposed development to the adjacent Noosa National
Park may be mitigated by retaining a “buffer zone” of native vegetation between the development and
the national park. The buffer zone will also provide some small corridor values for north/south fauna
movement between areas of more extensive habitat, and may also provide forage, shelter and breeding
habitat for fauna occurring in the adjacent national park areas.

It is unlikely that removal of vegetation from the proposed development footprint will result in any
significant impacts on fauna species that occur throughout similar habitat within the site and in the
wider locality. Much of this vegetation type will remain in the southern area of the site following
development, and this area will continue to function as a “stepping stone” of habitat for mobile species
such as birds and bats.




Grasstree Court, Sunrise Beach     Ecological Assessment Report (BCR02)                PLACE Environmental

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