Full timeline revealed for staged opening of Wangetti Trail
Hikers and bikers planning to kick up dust on Wangetti Trail will have to wait more than three years for the full 94km trail to open amid ongoing talks with another set of native title claimants.
Cairns
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Hikers and bikers planning to kick up dust on Wangetti Trail will have to wait more than three years for the full 94km trail to open amid ongoing talks with a new set of native title claimants and Douglas Shire Council.
On Friday, Tourism Minister Stirling Hinchliffe signed Indigenous Land Use Agreements with the Djabugay Nation in a ceremony at Buchan Point to secure construction of the trail as far as the Mowbray River.
Under the deal five years in the making, Djabugay Nation rangers will be responsible for trail maintenance, weed control, up-keep of campsites and will provide on-country cultural experiences for trail users.
Native title applicant for the Djabugay Nation native title claim Gavin Singleton said the trail would offer an opportunity to share the culture of his people to the world.
“But also other opportunities will come out of it in terms of providing guided tours, also maintaining country, so land management, which will be really crucial for ongoing opportunities for our people,” he said.
“And it’s going to be a really good healing process for our people.”
The first stage of the trial from Palm Cove to Ellis Beach will be operational by the third quarter of 2024, the second stage from Ellis Beach to Wangetti will be open by the second quarter of 2025.
And the full trail is scheduled for completion around late 2026, eight years after the project was conceived in 2018.
One of the many hurdles to the project, Section 34 approvals under the Nature Conservation Act, which governs leases over protected areas, has been signed off on.
Other delays to the tail’s construction have centred on a pending native title claim of the Djabugay Nation made of the Djabugay, Bulway, Yirrganydji, Nyakali and Guluy Peoples.
Complexities of other native title groups including the Eastern Kuku Yalanji People and the Yirrganydji (Irukandji) People who have laid claim to land north of the Mowbray River have yet to be ironed out.
Mr Hinchliffe said “ongoing work” was happening with Douglas Shire Council to secure passage of the trail into the town of Port Douglas.
“The very fact that Douglas Shire has come on board with this process … shows great confidence to me that we have a great working partnership,” he said.
Championing the Wangetti Trail from the get-go Cairns MP Michael Healy said the trail represented a tangible reconciliation vehicle that would provide a solid future for local traditional owners.
“Today is a significant celebration,” he said.
“This is what reconciliation looks like, this is what it feels like and I’m so proud to be part of the government that gets it.”
The trail is expected to generate about $300m in economic benefits.
FIRST NATIONS TRAINEE DIGS INTO TRAILWORK
As a young lad, Touche Gray played in the sand pit with his Tonka toys and dreamt of getting behind the controls of a real life excavator.
The Djabugay Nation man’s ambition has now been realised after landing a job as a plant trainee with the company contracted to build the Wangetti Trail through lands of his father’s ancestors.
The Yarrabah man will soon start work operating excavators and machinery with Wagners.
“My father was a heavy machinery operator … and I always wanted to follow my dad to work while he was operating the front end loader,” he said.
“It’s been my dream job since I was like four-year-old when we had Tonka trucks and remote control vehicles.”
In a nod to healing after his family was forced from ancestral lands in the Speewah area, Mr Gray said he understood the potential of the Wangetti Trail to bring about a meaningful reconciliation of two cultures.
“Today we are still here standing and that’s what makes us stronger,” he said.
“We are all here together on this journey and at the end of the day there is only one human race on the planet.”
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Originally published as Full timeline revealed for staged opening of Wangetti Trail
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