Rock Magazine

The deadline for submissions on the possible rezoning of natural lands around Helensburgh and Otford is 16 August 2010. The rezonings will compromise this key wildlife corridor between Royal National Park in the north and the Illawarra Escarpment to the south.

Over the years the surrounding Sydney Metro and Wollongong surburbs have consumed and fragmented so much natural bushland with housing development and freeway networks that the only remaining wildlife corridor between the National Heritage Listed Royal National Park and the Illawarra is through Helensburgh, Otford and Stanwell Park. The National Parks Association of NSW (NPA) has been submitting to Wollongong City Council and the NSW Government for several decades to emphasise the need to maintain and enhance the integrity of these three habitat corridors south of Royal National Park.
Until this time all the vegetated lands in the Upper Hacking River Catchment have had a 7D (Environmental Protection) zonation, but in response to the possible relaxing of environmental constraints on development, the NPA has launched a massive campaign targeting Wollongong City Council’s current proposals to allow some vegetated areas to be zoned for houses and light industrial development. According to the NPA any 7D zoned land should all be zoned E2 (but allowing replacement of existing buildings in the event of disaster) to ensure the environment of the northern Illawarra continues to be protected.

TAKE ACTION

See http://www.otfordeco.com/submission.php for a user-friendly way to register your protest to this compromising of Australia’s first national park. ??Alternatively, write to:

General Manager (Attention Planning Department and Administrators)                                 
Wollongong City Council
Locked Bag 8821
WOLLONGONG 2500
or at records@wollongong.nsw.gov.au