East Gippsland Shire Council will close part of the Mitchell River Walk as part of a vegetation management plan to ensure public safety, with poplar trees along the stretch deemed unsafe, while considering the grey headed flying fox colony within the area.

At Tuesday’s ordinary council meeting, councillors voted to close part of the Mitchell River Walk, with an alternative route to be created along Riverine Street for that section.

The walking track extends along each side of the Mitchell River within council-managed Crown Land and represents a significant piece of recreation infrastructure for the Bairnsdale community.

East Gippsland Shire director community strategy, Kate Nelson, said over time council has undertaken removal of weed species along the river, in particular poplar trees, and has supported the revegetation of the riverside with appropriate native species. The last section of poplar trees have been assessed independently and found to be an unacceptable risk to users of the track and require removal. This section is habitat for a grey-headed flying fox (bats) colony. Legislation determines that any activities that would impact the colony or their habitat require approval, which council has been granted subject to meeting a range of conditions.

These conditions are currently impeding council’s ability to undertake any further work.

While it was acknowledged that closing a section of the walk would result in a level of disruption to users, it was considered important that council be able to appropriately manage the risk to users as well as the bat colony.

The Bairnsdale parkrun utilises the walk every Saturday morning, so will be impacted by the closure, however Ms Nelson said parkrun organisers understand the rationale and are happy to work with council regarding the matter.

A section of the Mitchell River Walking Track will be closed between private land located generally in the vicinity of 100 Riverine Street and the viewing platform located at the intersection of the Mitchell River Walking Track and the connector trail from Riverine Street between Turnbull and Mitchell streets.

Appropriate signage redirecting users will be installed with upgrades as required to the shared path infrastructure on Riverine Street.

Cr Jackson Roberts asked why, considering the trees had been deemed unsafe for some time, this had not been addressed sooner?

“Over the past two years when we have had potential opportunity to remove the trees we haven’t been able to do that, so we have been monitoring them as best we can in order to understand how they are travelling. It’s a risk assessment. It’s not a prediction that a tree will fall,” Ms Nelson said.

“Given some of them were assessed as having fairly imminent potential to impact on users, we were better to take a proactive approach this year while we review the future access of this particular site.”

Cr Roberts asked if, in light of the change in the site category for the bats from a summer camp to a maternal roosting site, should the existing permit be forfeited and renegotiated?

Ms Nelson said gaining approval had been a very long four-year process and “the reality is that very soon after we gained our approval we actually had something like 60,000 bats in- habit the area”. “So there’s been some substantial shifts in the population and the length of times that they’re staying,” she said.

“The conditions on our permit now currently make it very difficult for work to take place, even to undertake work to meet our conditions of approval.

“There needs to be an opportunity to review the circumstances. I am also aware that the Commonwealth Government has freed up opportunities for councils to manage vegetation in colonies, so in some cases it may be that it’s easier to undertake work with cooperation from the Victorian Government without a permit.

“The balance we’re trying to seek is managing the risk to users but also to the colony and to the organisation.

“We have elected not to do work on quite a number of occasions because it’s just not appropriate to do that.

“We also need to be sensible about the fact that there are a large number of people accessing through that site.

Council finds itself between a rock and a hard place in trying to manage that balance.”

Cr John White suggested removing the offending branches and not the entire trees, which he felt would suit the bat colony and the users of the walk, however Ms Nelson said workers are currently unable to undertake work in and around the colony.

“We can’t act on our Commonwealth permit, because we are prevented from doing works from the end of July because there is too great a risk to the colony and the bats are fairly heavily pregnant. We would also need permission from the Victorian Government under the Wildlife Act to disrupt them,” Ms Nelson said.
She said the work is designed and budgeted for, “We just need the right conditions so that we can undertake the work without impacting the colony”.

Cr Roberts put the question as to whether the responsibility could be handed over to another government body with more specific resourcing and experience around wildlife management.

“There are very few situations where people manage wildlife, certainly not in an urban environment,” Ms Nelson said.

“I need to emphasise, we’re not managing the wildlife, here, we’re managing the vegetation.”
Cr Dick Ellis said it was a very complex issue.

“The precinct that we’re talking about, there’s strong, not only ecological strengths but it also has a high heritage meaning to people,” he said.

Cr Colin Toohey said while complex, it required immediate action to ensure the safety of users of the track.

Lisa Roberts, of Friends of Bats and Habitat Gippsland, which has more than 200 concerned residents supporting the current grey headed flying fox roost site in Bairnsdale and its protection and management as a conservation reserve, requested council consult with them as a way of moving forward.

Ms Nelson said council officers were aware of Friends of Bats and Habitat Gippsland and had met with the group, undertaking to include them in any engagement in respect to activities associated with the management of vegetation along the Mitchell River Walking Trail.

With the reality no work will take place until next year, council officers will present an update of the review at council’s December meeting.

While shire officers are yet to determine exactly what review of the situation will encompass, Ms Nelson said they will be happy to take on board and discuss issues with the Friends of Bats and Habitat Gippsland representatives.

The motion to close the stretch of the walk currently inhabited by the bats was carried, Cr Roberts voting against the motion.