Council moves to support beach use

Horse riding and four wheel driving will be allowed to continue at two of Busselton’s most popular beaches, with the City of Busselton Council resolving to retain the existing permitted uses, while improving infrastructure.

At its meeting last week, Council decided to maintain current approvals in specified areas in accordance with existing regulations at Wonnerup beach and Forrest beach, while ensuring people are using the beaches appropriately.

The decision follows the results of a community survey held earlier this year, where the majority of responders indicated they were against major changes to the rules.

Of 652 responses, 71.5 percent were ‘unhappy’ or ‘very unhappy’ about the idea of modifying the existing uses of each beach, and 70.7 percent were ‘unhappy’ or ‘very unhappy’ about implementing seasonal rules and time restrictions.

“It was very clear from the survey that people did not want to see the current uses changed, but there was a strong message from the community that compliance issues needed to be resolved,” Mayor Phill Cronin said.

“We wanted to address escalating community concerns relating to safety and amenity associated with inappropriate beach use in the Forrest beach area and with new infrastructure, including signage, all beach users should be very clear on which areas they can conduct their activities.

“It is also critically important that we do what we can to protect the coastal environment, and the new infrastructure should serve to prevent further damage to our dune systems.”

The City said Council had allocated $100,000 across the next two financial years to install infrastructure to better manage access and amenity at the beaches.

“We have committed to constructing a formal car park for horse floats, as well as some other infrastructure such as bollards and signage, which should ensure people using these beaches are doing so in accordance with the permitted uses,” Mayor Cronin said.

“On behalf of the Council, I thank the community for bringing these issues to our attention and for taking the time to provide comments through the survey which helped inform our decision.”

Full survey results are available on the City’s Your Say Busselton engagement platform.