Meeting papers

Coastal hazards monitoring
As part of its strategy to manage climate change impacts along the coastline, Council developed a
long-term Coastal Monitoring Plan in 2022 which sets out annual monitoring activities to:

  1. Better inform coastal management measures;
  2. Identify key areas requiring future management; and,
  3. Provide data for future coastal hazard studies.

This work responds to a key message received from the community during the development of
localised data collection and monitoring of the coastal system should be prioritised to better
understand and model the impact of coastal hazards driven by climate change. This data will
inform future climate change mitigation actions and provide feedback on the outcomes of current
and future management.

The monitoring plan includes a range of data collection methods including remote sensing
techniques to capture shoreline position, beach levels, beach volume, seafloor levels, vegetation
extent and density, seafloor sediment volumes, and the movement of creek outlets. The data
collection methods include upper beach surveying, photogrammetry and LiDAR topography from
drones, fixed cameras, CoastSnap citizen science sites, water-based surveys using single beam
echo sounders, and satellite-derived bathymetry. The coastal monitoring program is scheduled to
be undertaken annually, before and after the storm season.

Current beach and dune condition
In the early seventies, a series of severe storms and cyclones caused severe erosion to many of
Queensland beaches. In Noosa significant dunal erosion occurred and extensive area of coffee
rock were exposed on the beaches. In many places dunal vegetation was lower and less dense.

Over the last 50 years, Noosa’s Eastern Beaches have benefited from relatively stable weather
conditions with only minor to moderate erosion events happening periodically, interspersed by
steady accretion as the beaches, dunes and vegetation have recovered. The dunes and beaches
are much wider, coffee rock is only occasionally exposed on the beaches, and dune vegetation is
much denser and covers a much bigger area now than after the 1970’s coastal erosion events.

From a risk management perspective, careful planning requires Council to consider the impacts of
future events like the early seventies events and put measures in place to minimise impacts.
Ensuring a healthy dune system is an important measure toward this as outlined in the CHAP.
Under future climate scenarios we may see the increased frequency and severity of major storm
events that trigger erosion.




Eastern Beaches Foreshore Reserves Management Plan 2023                                    Page 25

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