Meeting papers

16. Foreshore tenure and gazettal
Appropriate tenure and gazettal of public land can be critical to protecting its values and achieving
long term objectives. The EBFRs are a mix of public land tenures and reserve purposes, including
reserves for community purposes with Council as Trustee, unallocated crown land, esplanade and
some areas that don’t appear to have any property description at all.

Undescribed land and unallocated state land
Public land without a property description is common on our foreshores. In many places there is
currently vegetated land to the east of the gazetted reserves that doesn’t have a property or road
parcel description, mostly recent dune build-up and native vegetation regeneration. There may be
some areas of undescribed land in the network of reserves and road reserve that make up the
foreshore reserves. There is also unallocated State land with a property description that does not
appear to be a reserve under a Trustee arrangement or have any formal arrangements for Council
to manage. In reality Council manages this land as the Trustee.


Existing Reserve Community Purpose
Many of the current gazetted reserve purposes may not be appropriate for our naturally vegetated
foreshores – for instance recreation reserves are supposed to be developed in some way for
‘recreation’. The gazettal of the foreshore reserves was highlighted during the initial consultation
and in other coastal management forums. It is seen by some as a barrier to managing the
foreshore reserves as natural areas to help manage climate change and may pose challenges
regarding community perception about how these areas are being managed.


New reserve community purposes
Newer and perhaps more appropriate community purposes for the Eastern Beaches foreshore now
exist under the Land Act, reviewed in 2017. They may better reflect the current condition of the
reserves and our future management intent as expressed in the CHAP and other strategic
documents. These include beach protection, coastal management and environmental protection.

Some are concerned that none of these community purposes expressly protect public access to
foreshores and beaches. This concern is acknowledged and recognised with long-term
maintenance of community access to foreshores and beaches being a management objective in
this Plan and a central plank of any tenure and gazettal discussions with the State Government.


Land Management Plans
Land Management Plans facilitate a process that allows state and local governments to come to an
agreement about detailed reserve management. They can recognise local reserve management
documents and deal with issues such as foreshore access that are not specifically dealt with in the
community purpose description. These could be both an interim and long-term measure.


EBFMP Management actions
The following actions are identified for implementation:

 Action                                                          Responsible         Due date and
                                                                 partyResponsibility status
     •    15.1. In collaboration with Council’s Property         Environmental       TBA
          Services and the State Lands Division explore the      Services
          best way to secure the EBFR values in the long         Property


Eastern Beaches Foreshore Reserves Management Plan 2023                                       Page 74


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