North Creek

In November 2017 Council applied for a grant under the DPE Coastal and Estuaries Grants Program to commence a Coastal Management Program (CMP) for North Creek. A Coastal Management Program consists of five stages and aims to design a long-term strategy for multifaceted coastal management as defined by the aims and objectives of the Coastal Management Act 2016 (CM Act).

The five stages of the CMP are:

1. Identify the scope of the CMP
2. Determine risks, vulnerabilities and opportunities
3. Identify and evaluate options
4. Prepare, exhibit, finalise, certify and adopt the CMP
5. Implement, monitor, evaluate and report

The scoping study for the North Creek CMP was completed in December 2019 and following an extensive literature review, identified the scope of the North Creek CMP.

As a result of the Scoping Study findings, it was recommended to undertake further studies which included:

• Collection of high-resolution topographic data to 0.1 m vertical resolution of the entire catchment.
• Bathymetric survey of all key drains and the estuary channel.
• Development of a hydrodynamic model of the catchment to assess flow dynamics and drainage pathways and impacts on existing land uses. A coupled catchment-coastal model including tidal and storm tide inundation.
• Implementation of a North Creek Water Quality Monitoring Program (WQMP) which will include ambient and event-based monitoring for over 18 months across different areas of the catchment.
• Development of a Source Catchment model of surface and groundwater pathways using outputs from the hydrodynamic model and WQMP to assess pollutant pathways through the catchment.

Following the recommendations of the Scoping Study and grant funding obtained in February 2021, Council initiated Stage 2 of the North Creek CMP. Hydrosphere Consulting will undertake the water quality monitoring, reporting, stakeholder engagement, options assessment, surveying and project management and have nominated Water Technology to undertake the Hydrological Modelling component. 

A land use history of North Creek was developed as part of the work completed under Stage 1 of the CMP for North Creek. It looks at how the North Creek has evolved from when only Bundjalung people lived here, to the creek as we see it today. Many changes have occurred, from the breakwall being placed at the mouth of the Richmond River, to clearing and floodplain drainage. 

• Hydrosphere Consulting - Project Communication Portal
• Coastal Design Guidelines
• Coastal Management Toolkit
• North Creek Scoping Study including all attachments(PDF, 17MB)
• North Creek Dredging Scoping Study(PDF, 4MB)
• North Creek Dredging Sediment Investigation Report(PDF, 4MB)
• North Creek Dredging Program Baseline Shorebird Survey(PDF, 7MB)