In a clear case of public safety over-ruling aesthetics, Gibraltar Falls in the Tidbinbilla Valley will remain shut off to the public until new 1.5-metre high steel fencing is built across the top section to deter climbers.
The tender notice for the work posted by the ACT government says that "vegetation will be removed at the site" beforehand, presumably by the rangers.
The vertical steel rail fencing required is certain to be visually jarring in a natural environment, and the construction work will require the concreting of dozens of tall supporting posts along the track.
The tender, which closes on April 30, seeks a contractor to build 210 metres of steel fencing which will line the upper Gibraltar Falls walking track to deter people from walking into the rock pools area above the falls.
The objective, says the document, was "to further deter public accessing either the falls or surrounds". Curiously, the successful tenderer will be bound by a deed of confidentiality.
Two accidental deaths at the falls, both within one warm summer week during February 2023, set the alarms bells ringing within the Environment, Planning and Sustainable Development directorate and triggered a safety review.
The ACT Coroner is yet to formally conduct hearings into the accidental deaths of the two men, one of whom was a 19-year-old university student and the other a 22-year-old man from Queanbeyan. Both are suspected to have slipped and fallen.
The independent review of "proposed risk mitigations" was completed midway through last year.
However, in a troubling development, rangers reported that despite the deaths, in weeks afterward visitors to the area were ignoring the warning signs and taped off areas and continuing to swim in the pools and climb the rocks, which meant the whole area had to be fully closed down.
The tough new measures locked off the carpark gates, dropped concrete barriers along Corin Road to deter people parking on the roadway and walking in, and a plethora of warning signs and safety tape were placed across the access tracks to the top of the falls and the lookout area.
For decades a handrail, low barrier fencing and a maintained track has been in place to guide visitors to a lower location where they can admire the falls from below and take photographs.
Identified now as the higher risk access is the walking track, with a lookout platform, above the falls which winds its way down to Woods Reserve, further down the Corin Road. This is now blocked off but Woods Reserve remains open to the public.
There is no projected date for the falls area to reopen.
The bushlands to the east of Corin Road sit outside the core conservation and rehabilitation areas of the Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve, was officially gazetted in November 1971 and now forms part of the Australian Alps National Park
