Sandringham Foreshore Newsletter Spring Issue September 2013 SANDRINGHAM FORESHORE ASSOCIATION (SFA) Founded January 2007 ABN 42947116512 A CHARITABLE NOT FOR PROFIT VOLUNTARY ASSOCIATION SFA PO Box 52 Sandringham 3191 E-mail: sandyforeshore@optusnet.com.au Website www.sandyforeshore.net.au From the president of SFA Dr Vicki Karalis

In this issue, SFA are proud to profile Cristian Silver, our co-editor, who has written an historical reflection about Sandringham’s  beaches  and  surrounding  village. Cristian wrote the beautiful profile of Ray Lewis in our last issue of the SFA newsletter June 2013, and is a long-term resident who grew up in Sandringham, observing its many changes. We are grateful for his contribution.

We are also pleased to announce that our meeting with the Minister of Environment and Climate Change, Ryan Smith took place in Parliament, together with our local MP Murray Thompson and representatives of the Department of Environment and Primary Industry (DEPI) – formerly known as DSE – and regional director of DEPI, Port Phillip Bay, Travis Dowling. We have met with the Minister twice, on one occasion on our beach in March, where he witnessed our concerns first hand. We have found him to be a delightful, bright person and we felt our concerns were fully acknowledged. Travis also joined me for a private walk along our beach recently. Subsequently a community expert coastal reference group has been established to help address these and other local coastal Bayside issues. This workshop will occur early October and is a joint venture of DEPI and Bayside City Council (BCC). The workshop will focus first on the Sandringham coastal processes issue, to be addressed as a priority topic. An external facilitator and coastal engineer have been appointed by BCC to ensure the workshop runs successfully with some positive outcomes at the conclusion of the event. An external coastal engineer will be engaged to provide technical information and review any proposed management options. We are confident of achieving some real outcomes to help address these ongoing coastal erosion problems. We are extremely grateful to Minister Smith, Travis Dowling, our local Council, Mayor, Councillors, DEPI and Murray Thompson, for their ongoing interest and support in our efforts to help protect our foreshore in Sandringham. We are also grateful to Dale and Ben Cohen of Cohen architects (Sandringham) who contributed their time to prepare a graphic design of our proposal to address the coastal erosion at the Sandringham beaches. This design was a nice summary of our proposal to assist the understanding of the needs of our beach. We are also privileged to discuss our proposal with Associate Professor Ian Goodwin, of the Marine Climate Risk Group, Climate Futures and Department of Environment and Geography, Macquarie University, some of the circumstances of the Sandringham beaches, and we value the on-going support from Dr Wayne Stephenson, who is now based in New Zealand at the University of Otago.

Below are sample photos of our local beach as it appears today demonstrating return of the sand to the southern beaches but sand depletion at Tennyson St beach, resulting in further cliff erosion over the past fortnight or so. We would value your thoughts. Yours with kindness, Vicki Karalis

Tennyson St beach 9/9/2013

Royal Ave beach 9/9/2013

Edward St beach 10/09/2013

Bayside City Council SFA value our relationship with Bayside City Council who liaise with us on a regular basis with issues affecting our local beaches, and to discuss areas that require attention. If you have any concerns, feel free to write to us: sandyforeshore@optusnet.com.au

Draft Bayside Coastal Management Plan 2012/13 Sandringham Foreshore Association thanks Bayside City Council for early consultation with the community in developing the draft Bayside Coastal Management Plan 2012/13. Committee members of SFA attended all of the workshops. These events were well attended by a number of passionate and enthusiastic locals – all sharing an interest in thoughtful management of our foreshore zones. The draft CMP will be produced and, once endorsed by Council, will go out for consultation prior to being adopted. Completion was expected in June 2013. The Coastal Management plan can be viewed by visiting the web link: http://www.bayside.vic.gov.au/Draft_Discussion_Paper_for_public_comment_December_2012.pdf For more information contact the Open Space Coordinator Simon Finlay on 9599 4444 and refer to Council's website: http://www.bayside.vic.gov.au/opencoast.htm Banksia Bulletin Banksia Bulletin relies on volunteered contributions from our wonderful community. Please find the latest edition of the Banksia Bulletin by visiting the web link: http://www.bayside.vic.gov.au/environment_banksia_bulletin.htm http://issuu.com/triermurphy/docs/bcc13488_banksia_bulletin_spring_20 SANDRINGHAM & BLACK ROCK REVEGETATION (BRASCA) Meet Bob Whiteway alternate Tuesday mornings 10-11.30am followed by tea. For more details: 9502 0060 (Bob Whiteway)

National Tree Day on Sunday 28th July Thank you to Jo Hurse, Bushland & Nursery Team Leader of Citywide for organising revegetation of the cliff face at Picnic Point Sandringham beach on National Tree day. It was well attended by a number of enthusiastic people who helped make it a successful day. Revegetation and retaining bushland is essential for preventing erosion of our cliffs. Below are photos of some of the

helpers working hard, but what a beautiful setting! (Permission received with kind thanks from Jo Hurse)

Talk on Beaumaris Bay Fossil site 8.00pm, Thursday 12th September St  Michael’s  Anglican  Church  Hall, 28-32 Dalgetty Road, Beaumaris You are invited to join Beaumaris Conservation Society for a talk on the Beaumaris Bay Fossil site by Celeste Ward, an RMIT research student who is studying the site. The talk details are: Impact Assessment of the Beaumaris Motor Yacht Squadron Safe Harbour Proposal Celeste writes: I am in my final semester of studying environmental engineering at RMIT University. My research project, supervised by Professor John Buckeridge, is an investigation  of  the  Beaumaris  Motor  Yacht  Squadron’s  redevelopment  proposal. I will be presenting my findings of the potential impacts of the

proposed safe harbour on the local community and environment. I will be specifically focusing on the geological significance of the site and the potential impact on sediment transport processes. The talk will be preceded from 7.30pm by the 61st annual general meeting of Beaumaris Conservation Society. Please phone: 0429176725, for any queries. Details on Beaumaris Conservation Society at: www.bcs.asn.au

Heart urchins (spatangoids) Lovenia woodsii

Fossils found in Beaumaris about 5 million years old

A snapshot history of Sandringham By Cristian Silver

Cristian Silver has worked as a tour guide, express coach driver and in the film/TV industry,

and has returned to freelance writing as a pursuit. Out and about he always enjoys

conversations with travellers and other dog-walkers about their own corner of the world,

and is most concerned that too many people spend too much time behind screens, staring at

small screens, and not noticing what is going on around them...

As part of the original Shire of Moorabbin, Sandringham was officially named in

1917. In the early 1900s the stretch of bay between Brighton and Beaumaris

was a popular retreat from the clamour of bustling Melbourne, and local retail

centres grew accordingly at the most attractive and practical seaside points –

most marked early on by the construction of a prominent hotel. Accessibility

grew with frequent rail services; the line constructed in the 1880s was the first

to be upgraded for electric in 1919, and the tram link to Beaumaris made it an

easy trip for holiday-makers and day trippers alike.

Apart from considerable (and not necessarily desirable) development, the still-

charming shopping strips have retained a surprising amount of character from

those times; consider the period buildings along Hampton Street or Bay Road.

‘Coffee  houses’  were  fashionable  then,  too,  (you’re  not  the  first  to  discover  

this repast) for the seaside visitor – take a good look around and you may

notice details that have survived. A good example is a 1900s advertisement for

sodas, previously covered in layers of paint, revealed on a building in Melrose

Street. Historic facades along Hampton Street have had important or colourful

history,  in  contrast  to  the  repetition  of  today’s  trends  in  suburban  retail  (the  

first  café  building  ‘Lido’,  c.  1910  still  survives  on  Beach  Road near Small Street).

The mixed-bag of the Bay Road shops also preserve some history, often

revealed as a new proprietor renovates – sometimes with more appreciation

for historic value than demonstrated in previous decades. Remember though;

the random, un-looked-after charm is fast-disappearing.

The seaside we love has changed, certainly. Seasides are always

changing; the tides come and go, the beach settles then is washed away in a

storm – you compare a photo from 1925 and it looks as now – in between

there are anomalies; the wash-out of 2005 looked remarkably similar to a

photo from seventy years earlier when a rare tornado struck the bay in the

1930s. General land features can be matched to those depicted in the

landscapes of late nineteenth century artists; consider Bayside  City  Council’s  

‘Coastal  Art  Trail’  which helps  reveal  the  prominence  of  artists’  experiences  

here during the Australian impressionist period.

Wind and water erosion are primary forces shaping the coastline, and

many things have been tried with varying success over the years to counter

them. Dumping road-fill, timber or rock groynes, and the famous bluestone

sea-walls are all attempts to preserve the natural asset which becomes less

‘natural’  with  each  attempt.  It’s  obvious,  in  retrospect, that attempts to

preserve the beaches is spent with the aim to retain the beach for ourselves –

maybe this is futile and selfish – yet it displays an endearing appreciation and

desire to preserve something we love which is rather out of our control.

Artificial additions have marred parts (Red Bluff car-park an example)

and – perhaps unintentionally – preserved others. The early planting of kikuyu

and pig-face has dominated some indigenous species, yet helped preserve the

cliffs from excessive erosion, while creating a colourful hillside in Spring. The

Canary-Island palms, fashionable in the age of rotundas, are landmarks in their

own right as much as the native banksias are at Ricketts Point. Native bird

species have adapted to the cover of introduced shrubbery, and indigenous

plantings are funded and supported with the aim to return diversity to the

coast – overseas visitors are often quite taken by our peculiar native plants.

Important publications by local authors (all branches of Bayside Library

Services hold copies) are excellent sources for further study to gain an insight

into  the  locality’s  social  and  environmental  history  during  its  formative  years,  

as experiences of those early residents have gradually passed from living

memory. And, people tell you things that become your own knowledge in a

way. One such person once wrote to my sixth-grade at Sandringham Primary

School, to describe Sandringham as she remembered it in the early 1900s. She

described floral heath spreading through to Highett, cattle grazing in Hampton,

and numerous  local  ‘characters’ well-known throughout the small community.

Where are they now, you might ask – or do you already know one or two?

Why is it that you moved to the area, whenever that was? Locals usually

express appreciation for the beautiful seaside before mention of the diverse

housing options, the train or bus close by (or even the myriad cafes). I recently

spoke to a woman of ninety-two (she proudly told me); newly married, she and

her late husband were attracted to post-war Sandringham because it seemed

distant from the city, from the noisy inner suburbs. Work could be left at

relative, though not inconvenient, distance. A much younger woman

described the same sort of thing after ten years living in London. An ex-hipster

enjoys it now – an alternative to the lifestyle he fled to Brunswick for, ten years

ago. Some of my own old school-friends have (with considerable effort)

managed to secure a home close to where they grew up, because they wish

the same for their small children, as they once enjoyed.

Travellers and tourists from Cities and towns with a suburban spread around a

bay, like this one, have said as much to me about places they were fortunate to

grow up in, which are now out of reach for (most of) their children – how the

bay here seems as home was to them, thirty or forty years ago.

So it is a thing to enjoy and preserve, where possible, and each

achievement made through community activism, to preserve a natural

environment (the recent Federal Government approval to retain part of

Highett’s  ‘Grassy  Woodlands’  is  a  notable  example)  or  sensible  approach  to  

developing the built environment is an achievement that, as local residents, we

should share proudly – be inspired to assist with – and continue where

necessary. Real estate copywriters will suggest with vivid buzz-phrases why

you should appreciate this suburb by the sea, but the people I often meet, in

any weather, out walking their dogs along the beaches from Hampton to Black

Rock, always allude to the same state of being; the feeling of freedom and

connection with nature not measurable in monetary or contemporary values;

the timeless walk along the seaside.

Historical photo of our local beach

Provided by Shirley Joy, Sandringham resident

Red Bluff, Sandringham Do you know when this photo may have been taken?

Notice there is no seawall at the base of the cliffs. Do you know when the wall was built? Please let us know your opinion.

We hope you have enjoyed reading the SFA Spring September 2013 newsletter. Yours with kindness, Dr Vicki Karalis, SFA President Assistant editors, SFA Newsletter: Helen Gibson & Cristian Silver SFA committee members: Alison Horton, Vice-President Adrienne Smith, Secretary Craig Francis, Treasurer Ike Solomon, Engineer Helen Gibson, Geologist Paul Hede, Architect Laurie Evans, Architect and local Councillor Ruby Campbell-Beschorner