New national park to protect vital koala habitat in southwest Sydney

Enhanced protection for Sydney’s largest koala population is being made possible via the state’s newest national park that winds along the Georges River in the city’s southwest.

Warranmadhaa (Georges River Koala National Park), located between Long Point and Appin, covers 962 hectares. Work is already underway to grow the park with more land transfers planned into the National Park system which will protect up to 1,830 hectares of habitat.

Koalas require large, connected areas of habitat so they can eat, move and breed.

Warranmadhaa National Park will safeguard the most important corridor in the area, facilitating the safe movement of koalas between Campbelltown and the Southern Highlands.

When fully established, the reserve will further protect Cumberland Plain Woodland and Shale Sandstone Transition Forest, which are both listed as critically endangered ecological communities in NSW.

Warranmadhaa National Park delivers on the NSW Government’s commitment to establish a koala national park along Georges River under the Cumberland Plain Conservation Plan.

The Plan supports the delivery of approximately 73,000 homes in Western Sydney and will minimise the impacts of development on threatened plants and animals at a landscape scale while creating protected suburban green spaces.

The name Warranmadhaa refers to the geography in the southern areas of the reserve and was chosen in close consultation with Traditional Custodians, the Tharawal Local Aboriginal Land Council and the local Aboriginal community.

The NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service has started the process to prepare a plan of management for Warranmadhaa National Park.

This will provide opportunity for people to have their say to help shape how the park will be managed to preserve its values and how it will be accessed and used by the community.

NSW Minister for the Environment, Penny Sharpe noted “This new national park is one of the most important in the state for koala conservation, protecting almost 1,000 hectares of vital koala habitat in southwest Sydney and delivering on our promise to safeguard this iconic species.

“$48.2 million has been committed to establish and manage this park, ensuring long-term protection for the south-west Sydney’s koalas.”

NSW Minister for Planning and Public Spaces, Paul Scully added “It is great to see this land in southern western Sydney transferred into the national park system to protect koala habitat in perpetuity.

“There is even more great news, in the longer term with plans to almost double the size of the park through future land acquisitions in the Georges River area under the Cumberland Plain Conservation Plan.

“This is a strategic approach which aims to balance urban development with the protection of important biodiversity including threatened plants and animals.”