Five-year activity update

ACANSW Inc became incorporated in 2019. Our primary aim is to advocate and promote responsible and sustainable access to outdoor rock climbing areas in NSW, although we also contribute to access submissions and discussions for other climbing areas in Australia and overseas as required.

Unlike states to the south and the north, the organisation was not formed in response to a crisis, which has its advantages, but means that mobilisation of climbers to join and participate in an access organisation can be challenging. The two most prominent campaigns we have been involved with include the response to an SBS story about climbing at Thompsons Point and the slow reduction in access at Point Perpendicular. However, there is a lot going on behind the scenes.

 

Partnerships/memberships and supporters

The Sydney Rockclimbing Club and ACANSW have a Memorandum of Understanding so that all SRC members belong to ACANSW. We are members of Outdoor NSW, which helps provide a conduit to Government. We have also interacted with many other outdoor recreational clubs and groups, environmental groups and industry.

 

Structure of ACANSW

ACANSW is based on regional coalitions that can deal with local issues and network with local land managers, as well as a statewide group that deals with statewide issues and legislation. In reality, a small core group of climbers in each region do most of the access work and crag care organisation, and more help is always welcome. There has been little time to allocate to marketing and membership, and we are now aiming at improving this by firstly changing the membership system to Membership Jungle.

A lot of time is spent compiling submissions. For example, production of a reasoned and appropriate submission can take a minimum of 10 hours of research and work.

 

Submissions

We have put in many submissions over the past 5 years. Submissions may deal with many things, including:

• Legislation that may impact outdoor recreation and access
• Plans of management (PoM) for natural reserves such as National Parks, State conservation areas, Forestry areas, council managed crown land
• Recreational strategies and natural spaces strategies
• Closure plans for mines and quarries that have suitable cliffs or boulders

Most of our submissions have furthered climbing access. Most people don’t realise that if climbing is not included in a PoM for a national park or state conservation area in NSW then it is not permitted. These PoM are meant to be revised every 10 years, but many are 20–30 years old and don’t mention climbing, or forbid it, most likely due to litigation concerns that predated a change in the Civil Liability Act NSW in 2002 which reduced liability to land managers from people involved in inherently risky activities such as rock climbing.

Even if there is only climbing potential in a quarter of the more than 800 NPWS reserves, that is a lot of submissions to complete. Furthermore, councils are now required to produce plans of management for council managed reserves and crown land.

To date we have provided input for the following NPWS PoM, often at multiple levels of consultation: Blue Mountains and Kanangra Boyd NP, Ku ring gai Chase NP, Gardens of Stone SCA and Gardens of Stone NP, Tomaree NP, Bouddi NP, Royal and Garrawarra NP, Dorrigo-Binderay NP, Arakoon SCA and Hat Head NP, Glenrock SCA, Wollemi NP, Illawarra Escarpment SCA, Lane Cove NP, Ben Boyd/ Beowa NP, Radiata Plateau/ Ngula Bulgarabang RP, Wollemi NP. 

Where the PoM have been finalised, in all but the case of the Royal National Park climbing has been recognised, often for the first time, or expanded. For instance, we secured an amendment for the Illawarra Escarpment to permit climbing in areas other than Mt Keira, when it had previously been banned. Climbing was included in Bouddi NP and at Tomaree Head for the first time. The possibility of climbing at areas other than Barrenjoey in Ku ring gai Chase is now open, and we will set up a working party to move forward with this. One of the challenges awaiting us is that several new plans mention that climbing management plans or a consent process for bolting will be developed. This is something we believe needs to be aired widely amongst climbers, particularly route developers. Despite prompting, we have been unable to make inroads with this to date.

Other state relevant submissions include Wingecarribee Shire Council (Mt Gibraltar and Natural Areas strategy i.e. Mt Alexandra), Waverly Council (sea cliffs), Lake Macquarie Council natural areas strategy (a Burnley style outdoor facility), Blue Mountains council (matters ranging from escarpment plans through to parking meters), Great Western Highway alignment to prevent a viaduct over Centennial Glen, Glen Innes Council (climbing at Stonehenge and other areas) and Crown Land Act submissions.

We have growing recognition as stakeholders and have attended outdoor NSW conferences and workshops and have worked with NPWS stakeholder planning meetings and met with other council land managers.

 

Education and Stewardship

We also try and encourage crag stewardship and good crag etiquette through education and regional crag care events and trackwork. Blue Mountains, Hunter and Central Coast and Shoalhaven/Nowra have active crag care programmes. Our successful Conservation and Culture Forum in the Blue Mountains in 2020 covered the importance of Aboriginal Cultural heritage, land manager perspectives, birds, plants, chalk, poo and crag care. We have also written about similar matters in climbing media, had appearances at climbing events and helped with conservation projects eg rock wallaby surveys or lizard surveys at Kaputar. There is great opportunity to expand and further publicise these aspects, and we would love someone to take on the role of statewide crag stewardship with the aim of improving fundraising, securing project grants and growing this aspect.

 

Your membership fees help cover the annual cost of registration and system requirements for incorporation, for doing surveys and AHIMs searches when required, providing signage, parking designation and track care equipment for crags that exist on private land and more importantly will help build a fund to support legal advice when required.

As a long term aspiration, we can look to coalitions in the USA whereby Conservancies and climbers act together to purchase and preserve escarpments for shared ecological preservation and climbing amenity.