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GUERILLA GREENIES Herald Sun - 3 June 2003
A campaign of destruction by extremists including spikes on roads is endangering tourists and loggers in a forest near
Melbourne.The vandals are attacking roads in the Yarra
State Forest, a popular adventure playground about 80km east of the city. Spikes have been hidden in roads, and drains have been blocked in a two-year campaign that has suddenly intensified.
The Department of Sustainability and Environment is aware of at least 40 incidents in the area. Officials fear for the safety for some of the 230,000 tourists who flock to the region's forests each year. The forest, near Powelltown and Gembrook, is popular for mountain bike riding, four-wheel driving, camping, picnicking, bird watching and horse riding. DSE field staff are struggling to keep up with the dangerous campaign, believed to be the work of fringe environmental extremists. Planks of wood with nails were found buried in a forest road near Bunyip two months ago. Powelltown DSE field officer Rodney Lynn said he feared that the campaign would become more violent.
"It could hurt or kill someone. That's what we're worried about," Mr Lynn said.
Spiked roads could lead to disaster, he said. "They will cause punctures to vehicles and could cause a rollover or run a bus or log truck off the roads," he said. The department's senior forester for the Dandenong area, Nigel Brennan, said he did not believe it was the work of a mainstream environmental group. "It is probably someone with a green viewpoint who is also a bit of a nutcase," Mr Brennan said. Forestry Victoria general manager Peter Rutherford said the blocked culverts could also cause a disaster. There was a potential risk for road users, Mr Rutherford said. "If they're out there after rain, and the culvert has washed away . . . that will have a catastrophic effect."
The attacks had been reported to
police, he said. Most of the blocked culverts drains that prevent water building up across the road have been around Powelltown. At least 40 drains in the forest have been blocked, costing the taxpayer tens of thousands of dollars in repair work. Mr Brennan said the repair bill for culverts starts at $1000. Workers can spend an entire day unblocking culverts, only to return hours later to find them blocked again. Culverts are commonly blocked with logs, rocks, tyre tubes and roadside white posts bent in half. Gravel roads can be washed away if culverts are left blocked. Workers have been alarmed by recent developments, in which some culverts have been blocked with LPG cylinders, Mr Lynn said. "We don't know whether they've got gas in them or not," he said. "It could cause a massive explosion that will maim or kill someone." One road in the Bunyip area has been washed away and the DSE is currently assessing damage to another. "A lot of people come up here, and a lot of these things are happening on the tourist roads," Mr Lynn said. "It could hurt or kill someone. That's what we're worried about." Repairing sabotaged roads was diverting DSE field staff from normal duties, such as maintaining walking tracks and picnic areas, Mr Lynn said. One road in the forest had every culvert blocked.
The logging industry said the vandalism was most likely the work of extremists. Victorian Association of Forest Industries public affairs director Pat
Wilson said: "It is consistent with, albeit at the extreme end, the sort of things green activists have done in other areas of the state. "It's pretty bizarre. I don't know what the objective is."
A spokeswoman for the Wilderness Society said the vandalism was part of a dirty tricks campaign. The society's Central Highlands campaigner, Megan Clinton, said environmentalists were not responsible. "All of those groups have never engaged in any kind of this activity," Ms Clinton said. She claimed the road attacks were part of a dirty tricks public relations campaign by the logging industry or DSE. "This is a cynical attempt by the pro-logging industry to detract public attention away from the issue of logging within
Melbourne's water catchments," Ms Clinton said.
Ashley Gardiner, Rural reporter
Herald Sun Newspaper
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