Attachment 1 to Item 53 - Roadside Vegetation Management Plan

H AW K E S B U R Y C IT Y C O U N C IL R O AD S ID E V E G E T AT IO N M AN AG E M E N T P L AN
NSW Threatened Species Conservation Act 1995
The TSC Act identifies and protects animals and plants within NSW at risk of becoming extinct. Section
2.2.2 outlines the TSC Act in more detail.
Digital data on the extent of vegetation communities listed on the TSC Act were obtained from the HCC
Updated Vegetation Mapping Project (HCC 2007a). Individual threatened species records were
obtained from the NSW Wildlife Atlas. As with the EPBC species records older than 1980 were
excluded from the analysis.
The method used for incorporating State-listed EECs into the priority matrix was based on a score
system. Incorporation of threatened species into the priority matrix was based on a counting system
(Section 4.2.4).
4.2.3 Polygon and Point Data
The methodology used two GIS data types: polygon data layers (vegetation types and CSA), and point
data layers (threatened flora and fauna species).
The final conservation priority data layer was a polygon data layer. Therefore, the following rule was
followed when working with point data sources:
• A threatened species record (buffered point data) was considered to be located on a road
when any part of the buffered 100 m or 500 m point was within a road polygon.
4.2.4 Scoring and Counting Systems
A scoring system for vegetation and CSA was used to indicate a road’s conservation priority. A
counting system was used for all other input layers. Table 2 and Table 3 show the scores allocated for
the vegetation and CSA data layer classes. These were scaled to reflect the relative importance, or
conservation priority, of each class.
Table 2: Conservation Priority Scores for Vegetation
Classes.
Table 3: Conservation Priority Scores for CSA
Classes.
CLASS
SCORE
CLASS
SCORE
EEC 3
Other Native Vegetation 2
Weed Plumes 1
No Vegetation 0
Core 4
Support for Core 3
Other Native Vegetation 2
In regards to the counting system for counts of threatened species under Federal and State legislation,
records were first buffered (by 100 m for all threatened flora species records and 500 m for all
threatened fauna species records, except Cumberland Land Snail Meridolum corneovirens, which was
buffered by 100 m). Numbers of records for flora and fauna species within each rural road were then
tallied (note, the number of records were counted, not the number of different species), and these
numbers were used to indicate a road’s conservation priority according to Federal and State legislation.
The method required the addition of scores/counts allocated or calculated for each input layer per road.
The combined score/count simply considered all inputs in the calculation.
It is acknowledged that the use of a scoring system for the classification of threatened species
(vulnerable or endangered) may have been used as an alternative measure to input into the
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