CONTENTS Understanding sand 05 Moving sand 06 River of sand 07 The Bypass Surgeon 10 Cook Island 12 Crossing the bar 14 Tickets please 21 Wayne Bartholomew 22 Snapper 27 Kirra Reef 28 Rainbow Bay 30 Duranbah 33 tweedsandbypass.nsw.gov.au Content and Design: NSW Department of Industry – Lands and Comms&Co Photography: Natalie McComas Aerial Photography: Wes Palmer Illustration inside back cover: Luka Va Printed by: Chambers Whyte Design & Print Printed on Ecostar 100% Recycled Paper Instagram: @tweedsandbypassing Tweed Sand Bypassing wishes to acknowledge and pay respects to the Bundjalung People and their decendants. The Traditional Owners of the Tweed and Southern Gold Coast region. © Tweed Sand Bypassing through the State of New South Wales (Department of Industry, Skills and Regional Development), and the State of Queensland (Department of Science, Information Technology and Innovation) 2017. You may copy, distribute and otherwise freely deal with this publication for any purpose, provided that you attribute Tweed Sand Bypassing as the owner. The information contained in this publication is based on knowledge and understanding at the time of writing (March 2017) and may not be accurate, current or complete. Tweed Sand Bypassing, the author and the publisher take no responsibility, and will accept no liability, for the accuracy, currency, reliability or correctness of any information included in the document (including the comments, opinions and other material provided by third parties). Readers should make their own inquiries and rely on their own advice when making decisions related to material contained in this publication. 4 Understanding sand Sand, or the movement of it, is perhaps the main reason why 85% of the Australian population lives within 50 km the sea. There are many natural elements that make coastal living so attractive - but it is sand that keeps things interesting. It is sand that moves with the break of each wave, the sweep of each tide and the fury of each storm. It is sand that is moulded into castles, shaped into surfing banks, and creates beaches that allow for relaxing time spent with loved ones. Sand is integral to our coastal lifestyle, to our identity and relationships; it changes the landscape with the ebb and flow of our lives. Tweed Sand Bypassing has been part of the unique coastal story of Tweed Heads and Coolangatta for nearly twenty years. Recognised around the world, the Project was created for two towns in two different States whose very identity, economy and culture depends on sand. Sand is constantly moving; the way in which it moves is impossible to accurately predict, and the preferred configuration of sand to form beaches and sandbanks is wildly debated. At the heart of Tweed Sand Bypassing is a desire to understand these challenges and to manage the movement of sand to enhance our coastal lifestyle. 5 Moving sand Tweed Sand Bypassing has been a part of the Tweed and With the occasional help from a floating dredge, the eleven Southern Gold Coast community for nearly twenty years. submersible pumps connected to the 450 m long Jetty at Letitia Beach have ensured the majority of coastal sand An ambitious infrastructure project, it is owned by both drift bypasses the Tweed River training walls. This sand then the New South Wales and Queensland State governments continues on its journey north, feeding and nourishing the (with financial and executive support from City of Gold beloved beaches of the Southern Gold Coast. Coast), and is operated by a private contractor. The Project was designed to address the very real environmental, The mixture of water and sand collected is pumped under commercial and social impacts created by a dangerous river the Tweed River and discharged predominantly at an outlet entrance and a sand supply interrupted by the construction located at East Snapper Rocks. Intermittent outlets are of river training walls in the 1960s. located at West Snapper Rocks and Duranbah, with a fourth outlet at Kirra. Finding a solution that would replenish the natural coastal sand drift and maintain a safe entrance to the Tweed River The quantity of sand moved by the jetty mounted pumps is took time. determined by the coastal sand drift itself. The pumps do not act like a vacuum cleaner on the sea bed, seeking out Implementing a solution that would support the economic and sucking up all available sand in their path. Instead, the and social growth of the community has involved experts water-powered pumps create a depression in the seabed, from around the world, professionals from two State and as sand is forced along the seabed by coastal drift Governments and many passionate members of the local builds up in these depressions, it is then captured by the community. system and pumped to a designated outlet. But in the 1990s a permanent jetty mounted pumping Tweed Sand Bypassing continues to support the very system supported by occasional dredging at the River essence of the Tweed and Southern Gold Coast lifestyle Entrance was decided upon, and Tweed Sand Bypassing – sandy beaches, a safe and navigable River Entrance and came into being. world famous surf breaks. Since 2001 the Project has operated to move the sand that drifts against its pylons on the southern side of the Tweed WEST SNAPPER River Entrance to the northern side. ROCKS OUTLET EAST SNAPPER ROCKS RAINBOW BAY PRIMARY OUTLET KIRRA OUTLET DURANBAH OUTLET SAND COLLECTION JETTY 6 River of sand WHERE DOES THE SAND IN NORTHERN NSW AND SOUTH EAST QUEENSLAND COME FROM? The sand that forms the wave at Snapper is on an ancient Through the process of longshore drift, this reserve journey that started high in the mountains of northern NSW continues to feed sand along the giant natural conveyor over 16,000 years ago. During this time the world was in belt from northern NSW towards southern Queensland. The the middle of the most recent ice age and the sea level was predominant south easterly waves push and drag the sand 120 m lower than it is today. The mountains of The Great on and off the beach, in and out of the swash zone, moving Dividing Range were higher, when compared to sea level, sand north and creating the region’s famous sandy bottom and eroded easily sending large quantities of quartz and point breaks. other rock down the rivers to the Pacific Ocean. The sand spills around large headlands such as Cape Byron, One of the largest sand reserves in NSW is just offshore flows in and out of estuaries, and tracks along the southern of the Clarence River near Yamba. As the ice age ended Queensland barrier islands until it reaches Fraser Island. and the earth’s climate began to warm, the sea level rose, Here, the sand finds its final resting place as it slips off the bringing the shoreline 20 km landward. The rising sea level, northern end of the Island and is lost to the deep waters of waves, tides and currents, pushed the sand that had been the continental shelf. deposited offshore towards the land, creating the current coastal landscape. It’s entirely possible that if you’re surfing The Pass at Byron, you may end up surfing over the same grain of sand years later at Snapper. CURRUMBIN No one knows exactly how large the Clarence sand reserve is, or how long the sand will continue to flow. What we do SANDY BOTTOM POINT BREAKS know is that the sand volumes moving along the coast of the NSW -Queensland border are some of the largest in Australia. With an average of 200 full sized swimming pools of sand moving on this journey beneath the ocean’s surface SNAPPER COOLANGATTA each year. LONGSHORE DRIFT SOUTH EASTERLY WAVES 7 YEARS OF OPERATION: AMOUNT OF SAND PUMPED: 8.5 MILLION CUBIC METRES AMOUNT OF SAND DREDGED: 2.2 MILLION CUBIC METRES NUMBER OF OSPREYS CURRENTLY LIVING AT 10 OSPREY CHICKS HAVE HATCHED SINCE THE JETTY: THE JETTY NEST WAS BUILT OBJECTS THAT GET SUCKED UP THE JET PUMPS SURFBOARD FINS 100 / YEAR SUNGLASSES 60 / YEAR FLIPPERS 100 / YEAR GOLF BALLS GOPRO CAMERAS 200 / YEAR 4 / YEAR L ENGTH OF THE JETTY M JET PUMPS: PROJECT STAFF: APPROXIMATE DISTANCE ,, THE AVERAGE NUMBER AVERAGE NUMBER FIRST GRAIN OF BOATS THAT OF BOATS THAT OF PASS THROUGH PASS THROUGH km S AND PUMPED THE TWEED RIVER THE TWEED RIVER TO SNAPPER ENTRANCE PER ENTRANCE PER YEAR ROCKS YEAR PRE-PROJECT POST-PROJECT EAST HAS (<1995) (1996-2016) TRAVELLED 8 9 The Bypass Surgeon FOR CIVIL AND COASTAL ENGINEER IAN TAYLOR, WORKING ON TWEED SAND BYPASSING SINCE ITS INCEPTION IN THE 1980s HAS BEEN CHALLENGING, REWARDING AND INFINITELY INTERESTING. How have you been involved with the Project? The problems were two sides of the same coin – creating a mutual need between Queensland and NSW to take action I was one of the multiple brains working on solving the and find options for dealing with this. There was a suspicion twin problems that had presented themselves to the about the impact of the extended river training walls on Queensland and NSW Governments during the 1970s – lack natural sand supply to Queensland, and it was clear that of sand supply to the Southern Gold Coast beaches and alone, they were no longer effective in providing improved a treacherous Tweed River Entrance. In 2002 I became the boating conditions at the entrance. So the question was Project Manager for eight years, and have recently returned asked – ‘What can we do?’. as a contractor, working on strategic issues for the Project. After years of studies, investigations and review, it was How did the Project come about? agreed that a Jetty mounted pumping system plus dredging system would be implemented.