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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 10 Hansard (25 September) . . Page.. 3371 ..

QUESTION ON NOTICE 441: Mr Corbell to Mr Humphries - 26 August 1997

Mount Majura Nature Reserve - Mountain Bike Championships

(1) What alternative sites were considered for this event and what was the basis of the decision to hold the event in the Mount Majura Nature Reserve.

Sites at Murrays Hill off the Cotter Road, Mount Stromlo, Black Mountain and Mount Majura were inspected. Several other sites were discussed but were discounted before inspection due to extreme environmental sensitivity or known technical deficiencies. Sites were assessed according to:

. event requirements, for example proximity to population centre and quality of access road to the top of the course;

. potential environmental impact; and

. technical requirements including altitude drop, proportion of trail downhill, total trail distance, mixture of fast and technical sections, area for start infrastructure and large flat open area at finish for championship village and car parking.

Mount Majura has regularly and successfully been used for regional Mountain Bike Championships. The same course was identified for the National Championships apart from a number of diversions off the existing fire trail.

Local community groups and conservation groups including the Conservation Council for Canberra and the South East Region and the National Parks Association and Greens MLAs were consulted and agreed to the running of the event on Mount Majura. A Working Group was established with Conservation Council, Cycling Federation and Environment ACT representatives to oversight the event planning and monitoring, and restoration following the event.

Mount Majura is defined as `designated land', in the National Capital Plan. The National Capital Authority (NCA) was therefore consulted about requirements for works approval and environmental assessment. As works required were only minimal NCA resolved works approval or environmental assessment was not required.

(2) What supervision of the event or other measures were undertaken to ensure the environmental protection of the site.

Within the nature reserve crowd control measures were implemented to keep spectators to existing trails and to exclude spectators from certain areas.

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