Green Gown Awards Australasia 2016 - Community Engagement Winner

Seeds of Change: Riverbank Restoration at The University of Queensland

By partnering with the university community, the State Government, and local NRM groups to plant around 12,000 native seedlings at UQ’s St Lucia campus, one of Brisbane’s busiest urban spaces, this project has restored habitat for threatened species (particularly birds) by creating wildlife corridors that offer food and shelter. It has also removed hundreds of kilograms of plastic waste from mangrove areas of the Brisbane river. The project is not only a useful case study for improving biodiversity in urban areas, but also represents a valuable community engagement opportunity for UQ: two of the three tree-planting stages were carried out by staff and student volunteers, and the restored riverbank presents UQ students and researchers with ongoing scope for ecology and environmental management learning, discovery and engagement.

Videos

• Video #1 (click to hide)