Portsea Beach turned into building site as trucks move in to repair 10 year old temporary sandbag wall
Portsea Beach has been fenced off all summer as the battle against erosion continues. But the $2.5m repair job won’t work, weary locals say, with one proposing a radical alternative.
South East
Don't miss out on the headlines from South East . Followed categories will be added to My News.
The latest attempt in a 10-year fight to save fast-vanishing Portsea Beach has been slammed as a multimillion-dollar, ugly “band aid”.
Locals say the Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning has turned what’s left of the beach into a building site, as they spend $2.5 million replacing a sandbag wall, which was first erected a decade ago as a buffer between the Portsea pub and clifftop houses and the advancing sea.
The work is being done despite a 2013 CSIRO report warning the bags were “exacerbating the problem, further eroding the beach in front of the wall and preventing any natural recovery.”
Traders and locals say it’s now time for a permanent fix to the problem.
“We’re just going to be going through all of this again in another 10 years time,” long time local Rod North said.
He criticised this latest protection attempt as an “expensive band aid”.
“I’ve seen tourists aghast at the sight of a fenced off beach dominated by an ugly rock wall. It beggars belief.”
The temporary rock wall was built to protect workers while they replaced the sandbags.
Mr North said makeshift stairs at the eastern end of the foreshore providing access to Lord Mayors beach were “a disaster waiting to happen”.
“You are taking your life into your own hands as this staircase is often suspended in mid air and not affixed to the ground with high tides,” he said.
The stairs are not blocked off but a warning sign at the base states the path is closed “due to
instability”.
Mr North has suggested building a rock sea pool similar to one created at Bondi, New South Wales.
DEWLP Regional Director for Port Phillip Stephen Chapple said the scaffold stairs would be removed this month and beach access via that route closed.
“Erosion of the beach and cliff means that it is not safe to replace this access point,” he said.
The original sandbag wall was built in 2010 following controversial dredging in 2008-09 to deepen the shipping channel so super-sized container ships could access Melbourne’s port.
The Portsea front beach all but disappeared after the dredging.
Real estate agent Liz Jensen, director of Kay and Burton Portsea, said some residents were so “heartbroken” over the loss of the beach they were leaving the area.
Lyndie Griffin, who splits her time between Melbourne and Sorrento, said she was sad her grandchildren would never enjoy Portsea Beach as she had.
“It looks terrible, but even when this last round of works is completed it still won’t give us back our beach,” she said.
The fresh sand bagging began earlier this week after work, which began in October, was stalled. DELWP now expects the repairs to be completed in March
MORE NEWS
SOMERVILLE MUM LEFT WITH “LIFE SENTENCE”
PENINSULA PUSH FOR EXTRA PLANNING POWERS
FIRST LOOK AT $160 MILLION KARINGAL HUB
Swimmers in the popular Pier to Perignon race will this year be directed to Portsea Camp for the presentation instead of Newton Park via the temporary stairs.
Portsea Life Saving Club member and event director Craig Evans said it was disappointing “given the history of this race” and said there were questions over the future location of the race.
“There’s so little sand left that it’s barely a beach,” Mr Evans said.