How Warringah Council fought to save Dee Why Lagoon

It might be smaller and shallower than its cousin to the north but Dee Why Lagoon is as vital to the aesthetics of Dee Why and Collaroy as Narrabeen Lagoon is to the suburbs that surround that lagoon.

Black swans on Dee Why Lagoon while seagulls wheel overhead. Northern Beaches Library

It might be smaller and shallower than its cousin to the north but Dee Why Lagoon is as vital to the aesthetics of Dee Why and Collaroy as Narrabeen Lagoon is to the suburbs that surround that lagoon.

But saving Dee Why Lagoon from development was a long and expensive battle.

In 1819 William Cossar was granted 500 acres at Long Reef and in 1821 was granted 200 acres covering Dee Why Lagoon.

Both of Cossar’s grants were bought in 1822 by Matthew Bacon and were sold to James Jenkins in 1825.

While Long Reef could be cleared and cultivated, there was little that could be done, agriculturally at least, with the lagoon and the wetlands that surrounded it.

Dee Why Beach c1910. Photo Northern Beaches Library

Both grants remained in the Jenkins family until Jenkins’ daughter Elizabeth bequeathed them to the Salvation Army, along with other land she owned, in return for an annuity for herself and her heirs.

The Salvation Army believed that, because it owned the land around the lagoon, it also owned the lagoon itself. The Salvation Army’s view was based on the argument that the waterway was a lake, surrounded on all sides by land that the army owned.

But in April 1910 the High Court ruled that the waterway was not a lake surrounded on all sides by land but a lagoon – and estuary of the ocean – and that it therefore belonged to the Crown.

Dee Why from Pittwater Rd, Collaroy. Photo State Library of NSW

But with the lagoon virtually surrounded by land owned by the Salvation Army, including the sand spit between the lagoon and the ocean, the public had virtually no access to the lagoon.

As early as 1903 a deputation was made to the lands minister, asking that Long Reef be resumed for the public, a plea that was repeated in 1913 when it was suggested that the lagoon should be set aside as a bird sanctuary. While the Salvation Army gradually sold its other land holdings at Dee Why for subdivision, the lagoon remained relatively untouched.

In 1920, however, the Salvation Army applied to subdivide the sand spit between the lagoon and the ocean, but was told by Warringah Council that “the construction of a road through it is impracticable” and that the application should be withdrawn.

Dee Why in the mid-1930s. Photo Northern Beaches Library

But the army continued trying to subdivide the sand spit throughout the 1920s.

Throughout the early 1930s the council repeatedly asked the Salvation Army to donate the sand spit and the land around the lagoon to the public and it also approached the state government to buy the land for the public.

By late 1932 the council was prepared to pay the Salvation Army for the land, as a last resort, and asked the army what price it would accept.

But the council’s plans were not as enlightened as they appeared – the council wanted to build a road along the sand spit to link The Strand at the southern end of Dee Why Beach to Pittwater Rd at Long Reef to form part of a scenic drive from South Curl Curl to Collaroy, while the land behind the lagoon would be set aside as a recreation area.

Dee Why Lagoon without a drop of water in it. Photo Northern Beaches

One councillor even suggested filling in the lagoon and turning it into a park.

In early 1934 the council considered levying its ratepayers one farthing in the pound to purchase the Salvation Army’s land around the lagoon but it also asked the state government to resume the land so the council’s ratepayers would be spared the financial burden.

The council also asked the state government for a loan so it could buy the land.

The council’s approaches to the state government were backed by the Parks and Playgrounds Movement, the Wildlife Preservation Society, the Zoological Society and by local progress associations.

But the Salvation Army was in no mood to be beneficent – in March 1934 it told the council it wanted £10,800 for its land around the lagoon.

Dee Why Lagoon. Photo Manly Daily

The only salvation was that the army said if the council bought its land around the lagoon for £10,800 it would donate the sand spit to the council at no cost. But with the effects of the Depression still being felt, the state government was in no position to be able to help the council financially.

Finally, in 1936, the Salvation Army agreed to sell the land to the council for £6200 – the value placed on it by the Valuer-General – and to give it the sand spit for free, although the council had to pay all the legal costs.

The sale was finalised in 1937. It had been a long, arduous and expensive exercise, but the lagoon was saved for the public.

Jack, George and Brenda Trim with a small boat near the Dee Why Lagoon footbridge c1928. Photo Northern Beaches Library

But the council was not as kind to the lagoon as the Salvation Army’s benign inactivity – at the southern end of the lagoon the council established a tip that resulted in the in-filling of a substantial area that is now occupied by the park behind Dee Why surf club, while a large swathe of the wetlands on the western side of the lagoon has been reclaimed for housing and light industry.

Anti-tank traps at the southern end of Dee Why Lagoon in Photo Manly Daily

When the council bought the Salvation Army’s land around the lagoon in 1937, it inherited an object that few people would remember – a timber footbridge across the mouth of the lagoon that the army built in 1925.

While nothing remains of the footbridge, which was probably demolished in the early 1940s, what does remain from that period are rows of timber poles that were driven into the bed of the lagoon at its southern end to act as anti-tank devices.