BROOME TOWN BEACH PROJECT

SIR GRANGE ZOYSIA PROVIDING A GREEN SPACE SOLUTION

The Town Beach Precinct is located at the southern end of Hamersley Street in Broome. This precinct is an important location for the local community and for tourism in the area. The area hosts recreational and cultural activities, attracting large crowds during events throughout the year.

One event in particular is the Staircase to the Moon event, which also includes a night market and draws in thousands of visitors each year. Unfortunately due to COVID-19 the area has not been able to host the annual festivities and markets coinciding with the event, but it is hoped that crowds can return as a boost to local tourism again in 2021.

The precinct recently underwent a significant project to enhance the experience and appeal of the area for both the local community and visitors. The large turf areas and playground facilities have been renewed providing an ideal place for families to gather. New terracing along the foreshore All images in this story- The Town Beach Precinct, Broome.

also provides an ideal vantage point for the ‘Staircase to the Moon’ phenomenon which occurs when a full moon rises over the exposed mudflats in Roebuck Bay, creating a beautiful optical illusion of a stairway reaching to the moon.

Project Overview

The project was considered very big for Broome, involving a full landscape and playground construction that involved many months of work for local business. With the tender for Head Contractor being awarded to local civil construction company Roadline Civil to complete the work commencing November 2019.

Head Contractor - Roadline Civil Contractors

Roadline Civil Contractors are one of the most respected civil and earthmoving contractors in the region. Roadline provides contracting services across a range of WA industries including government projects like the Town Beach Project. Sub-Contractor - Boab Design Landscapes

Boab Design Landscapes was engaged by Roadline Civil as an experienced subcontractor, to install the soft landscape, irrigation, turf, planting, and mulch.

Boab design is a Broome based landscape construction business operating for 18 years. Owner operator Steve Pearse, a Broome resident of 20 years, has worked on commercial and domestic landscaping projects throughout the Kimberley region.

Broome Climate and Soil Conditions

Broome is located in the Kimberley region with waters on both sides of the town. Broome has a tropical climate, with two seasons the wet and the dry. The hot and semi-arid climate makes for difficult conditions for many plants and turf varieties to thrive.

The area around Broome and Roebuck Bay is part of Pindan country, which is the

local name given to the red-soil and to the vegetation associated with the southwestern Kimberley region. The soils of this area are usually red, because of the high clay component, sandy and low in nutrient. This makes it susceptible to both waterlogging and drought.

Turf Selection and Supply

Sir Grange Zoysia was requested by the Shire of Broome, as they have had some good success with this species on another project in the area. With buffalo and couch species proving not ideal in similar conditions. The zoysia is seemingly the ideal species for the north west, particularly the location of the site.

Supply of the turf stolons needed to be arranged months in advance and the process was reasonably easy, thanks to the turf supplier for the project Lawn Doctor in Perth.

Turf Supplier - Lawn Doctor

Lawn Doctor is an accredited supplier of turf in Western Australia. Lawn Doctor’s turf farms

are located at Carabooda and Gingin, with a retail outlet, The Lawn Doctor Turf Shop in Wangara.

Ground Preparation and Turf Installation

The head contractor, Roadline Civil, cultivated the top 300mm of imported topsoil.

An organic mulch with cow manure was used, combined with a fine washed locally sourced sand. TerraCottem turf fertiliser was also incorporated.

Boab Design ordered the stolons, with an open door left for the exact date for cutting. The site was approximately 4000sqm, so the site was split up into reticulated sections and installed 250sqm at a time.

It was the wet season at the time and the heat was on average 37 degrees, with very high humidity. Mr Pearse and his team at Boab Design had to battle with a cyclone that passed the Broome coast and dumped a few hundred millimetres of rain on them during works. This rainfall was also an issue as it flooded the only road into Broome. Boab Design had to delay one of the orders, as the fear of having a truck load of stolons stuck in Port Headland for a week would have been costly.

Mr Pearse called Terry Sellick from Lawn Doctor a week before the stolons were to be cut, as they had a small window for delivery to Broome and where they would not be caught out by bad weather. The stolons would be cut on a Monday afternoon and delivered to the transport yard that day. They were loaded into 1 tonne bags on pallets and trucked up to Broome in around 28 hours.

As soon as the delivery was received in Broome, Mr Pearse had 5 staff waiting to quickly install the stolons. Installation of the stolons was done manually by spreading out onto the site by hand. The Sir Grange Zoysia stolons were planted in December at a 5:1 ratio. They then quickly followed over the stolons with a small ‘lawn mower sized’ stolon disc machine, to push in the nodes to ensure there was minimal drying out. There was unfortunately one drama during this process, with the trucking company delivering one of the 250sqm orders late. The delivery had a delayed Perth departure and also an additional stop-off in Port headland. The stolons sat on a truck in 35-degree plus weather, arriving on site 5 days after being cut. As a result, these stolons only had a 25% strike. Fortunately, Mr Sellick from the Lawn Doctor was able to help out and send up some replacement stolons.

Project Completion

The Town Beach Project was completed in January 2020. The Sir Grange is loving the Broome climate and was 90% covered by the end of March, in only 4 months. The turf areas in the precinct are now being mowed every week or two with a ride on cylinder mower and are looking great.