The recently rehabilitated Narooma shoreline is now officially recognised as the best landscaping project in the country, having won two major prizes at the Australian Institute of Landscape Architects.
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Wagonga Inlet Living Foreshore, an initiative of the Eurobodalla Shire Council, took out both the Award of Excellence for Land Management and an Award of Excellence for Climate Positive Design.
The Living Foreshore project aimed not only to reinforce a dilapidated seawall, but to provide protection from rising sea levels due to climate change.
REALMstudios, the landscape architecture firm that spearheaded the initiative, deployed bank stabilisation, saltmarsh rehabilitation and oyster reef restoration to revitalise the shoreline.
In June, the project won three prizes at the NSW awards, including the Minister of Planning and Public Spaces Award for Public Space, the Climate Positive Design Award and an Award of Excellence for Land Management.
Although her studio led the project, Cate Wallace, principal at REALMstudios said the award was in recognition of the entire community of people who contributed.
"We're incredibly pleased, but I suppose the way that we look at it is we're just the vehicle for accepting the award," she said.
"It's really a whole raft of people that need to be congratulated as well, including Eurobodalla Council and the Department of Fisheries."
In making its decision, the jury described the project as setting a new standard for regenerative shoreline design.
"The design is to be commended for leading the replacement of a failing seawall with innovative nature-based solutions that restored over 3,000 square metres of saltmarsh, brought back rare oyster reefs, and created vital habitats for marine and birdlife."
Ms Wallace told the Bay Post that while the win was undoubtedly a benefit to her firm, the real meaning of the award was being able to set a benchmark for future rehabilitation projects.
"What we're hoping this actually does is not so much for REALMstudios, but sets a benchmark for other coastal regeneration projects, not just in NSW but across Australia," she said.
"Climate change is happening now, but the effects are just going to increase as we move forward into this kind of sometimes scary future."
Tim Grey
Twice weekly
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