Exclusive: More than $30m needed to save 100 koalas as work starts on Coomera Connector
The Gold Coast’s Coomera Connector is on a collision course with the city’s largest koala population - sparking urgent calls to fast-track a solution. Read about the options and the costs
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The Gold Coast’s largest koala population, facing its biggest threat with the building of the Coomera Connector, will not survive unless the restoring of new habitat is fast tracked.
The Palaszczuk Government with its $2.1 billion “koala highway” about to be built is being asked by the Gold Coast city council to join on a Northern Corridor Koala Plan.
If more bushland is not secured and grows in enough time the koalas being relocated will be at risk, a confidential report warns. Almost $30m of taxpayer money has been spent so far on koala habitat.
The Labor Government which goes to the polls next year risks a backlash if koalas are lost.
Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk in a sponsored Facebook post in the past week on the Coomera Connector received more than 800 comments where residents threatened protests.
Coomera community advocate Stewart Brooker wrote: “What is the survival rate of koalas that have been relocated?”
Eagleby Community and Wetlands Group member Claire Taylor added: “Here in Eagleby our Community will continue to lobby to keep the Coomera Connector project from coming through our Wetlands.”
An investigation including confidential council reports and environmental studies has found:
* the Coomera Connector footprint is 775ha - of that 437ha is mapped as koala habitat.
* City officers warn of an “urgent requirement” for a corridor plan
* koalas will need to be moved due the highway and urban expansion
* the Greenridge property at Pimpama meets “offset” obligations from building the highway.
* restoring bushland could take 10 to 15 years due to “Commonwealth policy constraints”.
* it takes at least 10 years for the habitat to mature to support the koalas.
The closed door briefing to councillors warned the Coomera-Pimpama koala population was “at significant risk of decline”.
A core habitat of 1150ha was needed and securing the 407ha Greenridge was the first step “to prevent a population collapse”.
Almost $30m was spent last year by the state on securing the Pimpama site but sources
suggest the City will need to secure more land north of Coomera.
A council source said this would be “where the damage is being done” by the highway and new residential estates.
“Our intent is to preserve the Eastern Coomera koala population. We need to pick up land north of the urban footprint,” the council source says.
The key finding from studies is the koalas move east-west under the heavy rail line.
This hinterland connection must continue with the highway providing similar culverts.
But the pressures are increasing - studies show the Coomera koala population is among the least healthy and face regular vehicle strikes and dog attacks.
“Should the koala population - through breeding and translocation - exceed the carrying capacity of this isolated area, it will become unviable,” the council report says.
The Transport and Main Roads Department from its investigations says Greenridge will protect the local koala population and improve their home range and connectivity well into the future.
The Coomera Connector’s Public Environment Report released late last year showed thermal drone surveys identified 68 koalas residing on the Greenridge property.
But the real number is expected to be between 80 and 105.
About 55 tagged koalas are in the Pimpama River Conservation Area which is the proposed recipient site for translocated koalas from the Coomera Connector Stage 1 corridor.
Tagging and monitoring is one part of a wider Koala Management Plan with $500,000 set aside to support university research for a range of studies and vaccination trials.
TMR says it will design and construct permanent koala exclusion fencing to reduce potential impacts during construction of the Coomera Connector.
This includes Helensvale Road to Coombabah Creek and Smith Street Motorway Interchange.
The construction phase “presents the most intense short-term risk for koalas due to death from vegetation clearing or starvation and dehydration due to displacement from habitat”.
TMR’s key management goals are “no koalas will be killed or suffer serious injury as a direct consequence of vegetation clearing”. At least 40 will need to be moved.
KEY ENVIRONMENTAL MOMENTS IN BUILDING SECOND M1
* August 2022: The State Government secures the largest and most expensive piece of koala land in the Coast’s north, as part of an environmental deal to build the Coomera Connector, buying the Greenridge site for $30m.
* September 2022: The Public Environment Report (PER) is released. It finds the construction phase presents the most intense short-term risk for koalas due to injury or death from vegetation clearing and displacement from habitat. A key management goal is no koala will be killed or suffer serious injury. Findings include the highway will impact on habitat critical to the survival of the Parkwood-Coombabah Koala population. Minimum impact would occur at the East Coomera Koala population “as it is well outside the proposed action corridor”.
* October 2022: Residents can comment on the PER, a key plank of the $2.1bn project’s approval process. Transport Minister Mark Bailey says the Government will do what it can to protect koala habit around Pimpama, through Greenridge.
* Late November 2022: Councillors are given a confidential update on securing the Coomera-Pimpama koala population. Officers outline concerns. A redacted version is now available.
* Early March 2023: About 67 objections are made, some calling on Federal Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek to give it “the review that it deserves and ensure we’re doing the right thing by the koalas, and also by the community”.
* Late March 2023: Mr Bailey says the Commonwealth gives the green light to start work.
*Late March 2023: City councillors given a briefing on koalas by Currumbin Wildlife Hospital management. About 600 are treated each year — 300 for disease, 100 hit by cars and 50 caught by dogs. The Coomera-Pimpama population is the worst for chlamydia — twice the number compared to Helensvale and Parkwood koalas.
* May 2023: Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk talks up the Coomera Connector on a sponsored Facebook post but environmentalists and community activists post concerns about koalas. The vegetation clearing is yet to take place. Protective barriers will be put in place.
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