Technical Tour 1: Port Adelaide – living shoreline and coastal dunes

Join us for an afternoon exploring two key sites northwest of Adelaide, each showcasing the links between culture, ecology, and coastal management.

Our trip begins at Yitpi Yartapuultiku in Port Adelaide see https://participate.cityofpae.sa.gov.au/yitpiyartapuultiku), an Aboriginal Cultural Centre co-designed with Kaurna custodians. Here, a First Nations leader will share insights into the site’s cultural significance, followed by talks from a landscape architect and a coastal engineer discussing the innovative living shoreline project, an initiative aimed at restoring natural tidal flows and enhancing habitat resilience.

We will then visit the Tennyson Dunes, a section of coastal dunes along Adelaide’s developed metropolitan coastline. Over many years, a range of management efforts have aimed to restore native vegetation, control invasive species, and protect the natural dune system. This part of the tour includes a presentation on these initiatives, followed by a walk along the trail to see the dunes, their plant communities, and examples of ongoing conservation work.

Sponsored by SMEC

Technical Tour 2: Adelaide Metropolitan coastline

Join us to explore Adelaide actively managed metropolitan coastline. The tour will cover the unique features of this coastline and history of management approaches over the last 50 years, including the sand backpassing pipeline from Glenelg to Kingston Park and the West Beach and Henley Beach sand replenishment programs.

This tour will have key insights shared and discussed by representatives from the Department of Environment and Water (DEW) Coast Unit and the sand pumping system operators, McConnell Dowell. The tour will also be accompanied by knowledgeable DEW Coast Unit team members to share in the history and learnings of managing Adelaide’s metropolitan coastline.