Oxley Creek - Environmental Concerns

Environmental Concerns

Residential and industry development, sewage, sediment, land clearing and sand mining in the catchment have greatly affected the water quality of Oxley Creek, particularly in its lower reaches. At Larapinta sand mining converted the anabranch into the main stream, leaving a series of lagoons.

Key environmental issues that face the catchment include rapid population increase and development, altered flow patterns of the creek causing active erosion, deteriorating water quality, increased noise and vehicle movements, waste disposal, invasion of bushland by exotic plants and animals, management of the extractive industries and the day-to-day behaviour of residents and workers of the catchment.

Local councils and bushcare groups have worked to reduce sediment entering the creek by planting vegetation. By 2008 improvements had resulted in water quality tests on the creek system's rating lifting from a F to a D. However the rating returned to F in the following three years.

Effluent from the Oxley Waste Treatment Centre was released into Oxley Creek during the 2010–2011 Queensland floods. Levels of bacteria 250 times higher than normal were recorded in the waterway. Due to safety concerns parts of Oxley Creek were not immediately cleared of debris. Brisbane's Recovery Task Group has identified Oxley Creek along with a number of other waterways that are to be targeted in the recovery process that make take a number of years to restore. According to the Queensland Minister for the Environment, Vicky Darling by January 2012, $16 million had been spent to remove more than 2,000 containers of hazardous materials from the catchment. 500 tonnes of debris had also been collected from the banks of Oxley Creek.

Some locals want a groyne to be built at the mouth of the creek to aid flows and reduce sediment, while others want a halt to sand mining because it produces silt.