Palm Beach artificial reef: Gold Coast to get new surf break as council prepare to tick off project
COUNCIL today will tick off on an $18 million plan to save one of the Gold Coast’s most eroded beaches and create a new offshore “bommie” for surfers. But will it work?
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COUNCIL today will tick off on an $18 million plan not just to save one of the Gold Coast’s most eroded beaches but might create a new offshore “bommie” for surfers.
Councillors at a full council meeting from 1pm are expected to green light an officer’s recommendation for a two-year contract with Hall Contracting Pty Ltd and Heron Construction Company Ltd to build an artificial reef off Palm Beach.
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Documents provided to the meeting show the proposed “submerged control structure” will be 270m offshore at Nineteen Avenue.
The artificial reef will be built out of rock boulders, about 160m long and 80m in width.
Surfers in briefings have been told the structure is in two parts with its crest about 1.5m below the water level and 80m long.
Gold Coast World Surfing Reserve chairman Andrew McKinnon, who has attended the briefings, said the bottom part of the structure was flat but the second part would be on an incline towards the ocean.
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“We have a foundation level then a second tier which shapes back toward the ocean. Hopefully it will be a right to left wave like the an A-frame peak,” Mr McKinnon said.
“It’s halfway between the shoreline and shore break and then within the natural Palm Beach reef. People rarely surf out on the reef unless it’s a massive swell.
“There is no guarantee on this. We’re all hopeful it will work. It’s a great combination if it can protect the beach and create a great wave.”
Unlike the Narrowneck experiment in the late 1990s which failed when sand bags burst, the Palm Beach project will use boulders, take at least three months to build and by this time next year lead the way for new technology on artificial reefs.
Surfers are liking the Palm Beach experiment to a Bombora or “bommie” where waves break across a submerged rock shelf or reef located offshore.
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“This will allow the swell to roll up then get taken up on the slow incline,” Mr McKinnon said.
“This could be a mini-Bombora break. We are all hopeful it is going to work. If it does, it’s the first artificial reef to produce a rideable wave.
“If it works it’s going to be great. If it doesn’t, at least we save the beach for Palm Beach residents.”
Since Cyclone Oswald battered the Coast’s foreshore in January 2013, the council without financial help from state and federal governments developed a $30 million long-term plan for beach erosion which included the Palm Beach reef, extending a groyne at Kirra and building new rock sea walls along northern beaches.
Council transport and infrastructure committee chairman Pauline Young said the project represented “good value for money” and would be watched “around the world”.
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Testing had been ongoing for two years along with sand replenishment before work would begin next year on the artificial reef, she said.
“It’s a three-month program. It has to be done in the calm season. We will use a special type of rock,” Cr Young said.
“Some will be sourced from Brisbane, some from here. It will be barged out and there will be a crane. The plan is it won’t be rolled out until May, June and July next year when the ocean starts to flatten out.”