Decision makers are considering approving, the Southern Barossa Winery and Tourism Project, on very high bushfire‑risk land in the Barossa Character Preservation District RIGHT NOW, and we urgently need your help to put community safety first.
The lack of transparency in this assessment is also deeply concerning. Public submissions on SBWTAP have been provided to the proponent (the property developer) but are not available to the wider community, even though this is a development of major scale and risk. For a project like this, the assessment process should be transparent, with community evidence visible to everyone when available, not just to developers.
Please help by emailing the Premier, the Minister for Planning and the CEO of the Department for Housing and Urban Development and ask them to refuse approval for this massive development on very high bushfire‑risk, protected rural land in the Barossa Character Preservation District, putting up to 1,000 visitors and the local community in harm’s way.
Below is an example email you can use - you are welcome to adapt the wording to reflect your own views and experiences about the bushfire risk. It includes a link to our more detailed Preserve and Protect Barossa – SBWTAP Bushfire Risk Briefing document.
To:
premier@sa.gov.au; MinisterChampion@sa.gov.au; David.Reynolds@sa.gov.au
Subject:
Very high bushfire risk - Southern Barossa Winery and Tourist Accommodation Project (SBWTAP)
Dear Premier, Minister of Planning and the CEO of Department for Housing and Urban Development,
I strongly oppose the Southern Barossa Winery and Tourist Accommodation Project (SBWTAP) because it puts a large resort in a very high bushfire risk location with a single, compromised emergency exit.
As an interested person who values the Barossa’s communities, landscape and wine industry, I endorse the “Preserve and Protect Barossa – SBWTAP Bushfire Risk Briefing” and share its concerns about putting a six storey resort, nearly one and a half times the length of Adelaide oval, with more than 1,000 people, on very high bushfire risk land, with a single unsafe evacuation route. (See https://PreserveAndProtectBarossa.org/SBWTAP Bushfire Risk Briefing.pdf)
The recent Deep Creek fire, which burned thousands of hectares in steep, hard to access terrain and required hundreds of firefighters and aircraft over many days, shows how quickly fires can escalate and how difficult they are to control in rugged country. Concentrating a large resort in a similarly exposed, high risk landscape is not a theoretical concern but a real, foreseeable danger.
A major fire at the proposed site would endanger Barossa communities, threaten people, homes and businesses and put heavy strain on local services. It would also expose CFS volunteers and other emergency responders to unnecessary danger.
Such a fire could blanket the Barossa and Adelaide Hills in smoke, causing smoke taint to vineyards, with serious financial losses for growers and wineries and long term damage to the region' reputation and brand in domestic and export markets.
Across Australia, we are already seeing the consequences of ignoring risk: in other states, whole towns are now being relocated or radically reshaped in response to repeated fire and flood disasters. Those are tragedies that are hard to reverse. Building a large scale resort in this location would be an entirely preventable disaster.
Our State is at the forefront nationally in classifying land and creating no go zones for high risk areas and land uses. For this site, the planning framework makes it clear this use isn’t supported. The community shares that view — reflected in a petition that has drawn close to 1,500 signatures so far — and we are asking decision makers, bound by a duty of care to the public, to honour the intent of the system we all rely on to keep us safe.
I am also concerned that public submissions on SBWTAP have been provided to the proponent (the property developer) but are not available to the wider community.
For a development of this scale and risk, the assessment process should be transparent, with community evidence visible to everyone when available, not just to developers.
For these reasons, I respectfully ask you to refuse planning approval for SBWTAP, and to immediately make all public submissions on this proposal available so the community, not just the proponent, can see the full range of evidence and concerns that have been raised.
Yours sincerely
Please also consider:
- Sharing https://preserveandprotectbarossa.org with your networks.
- Asking others to sign the petition and send their own emails this week so decision makers can’t ignore the bushfire danger to; residents, visitors, first responders and critical escape routes.
Every extra email and every new signature increases the pressure on the Premier, the Planning Minister and the CEO of Department for Housing and Urban Development, to put life and safety ahead of a risky tourism development on protected land that should never be used this way in a bushfire‑prone Barossa landscape.
Thank you for your continued support and commitment to protecting the Barossa, from the proposed tourism resort, on very high bushfire risk protected rural land in the foothills of the Barossa, it is very much appreciated.