ASFB Home > Potential Changes in Prey Population Structure Following Removal of Predators by Fishing

Managing Impacts of Adjacent Development on Aquatic Protected Areas: Case Studies from the Declared Trinity Inlet Fish Habitat Area

Robert Coles, Rebecca Sheppard, Louise Johns and Kurt Derbyshire

Queensland Fisheries Service, CAIRNS, AUSTRALIA

Theme: TH5

Fish Habitat Areas (FHAs) are declared under the Queensland Fisheries Act 1994 to protect habitats and ecological processes critical to local and regional fisheries productivity. While developmental activities are severely restricted within the boundaries of FHAs, declaration of the FHA provides no control over potential impacts on the protected area from external sources. FHA managers may use a number of mechanisms to ensure that FHA values are not compromised by impacts from adjacent developments, including: use of other regulatory instruments; provision of advice and guidance to developers, planners and managers; education programmes. In addition, the formal recognition of the importance of an area of fish habitat through FHA declaration may in itself influence the decisions of planners and managers regarding adjacent development. Case studies from developments adjacent to the declared Trinity Inlet Fish Habitat Area - which protects approximately 7 000 ha of wetlands in Cairns, a rapidly-growing regional city in far north Queensland, Australia - are presented to illustrate the challenges of managing off-site impacts on aquatic protected areas.