Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Zoning (Administrative) Boundaries

Brief description

The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park (GBRMP) was established in 1975 and covers an area of approximately 345,000 square kilometres. The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park was subsequently accepted for inclusion upon the World Heritage List in 1981, meeting all four of the natural heritage criteria: geological phenomena, ecological and biological processes, aesthetics and natural beauty, and biological diversity (including threatened species). The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Act 1975 provides for the establishment, control, care and development of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park. Since the gazettal of the first area (or Section) of the Marine Park in 1983, the Marine Park has been progressively increased to its present area by the addition of new Sections. The Amalgamated Great Barrier Reef Section (the AGBR Section) was proclaimed under subsection 31(1) of the Act in 2003 (Gazette No S119 dated 21 April 2004). This dataset is a representation of the boundaries described in the schedules of the 2003 Zoning Plan for the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park (GBRMP). The Zoning Plan identifies 8 different zones within the marine park and sets out the purposes of use for each zone. The zones are: GU - General Use Zone HP - Habitat Protection Zone CP - Conservation Park Zone B - Buffer Zone SR - Scientific Research Zone MNP - Marine National Park Zone P - Preservation Zone Commonwealth Islands Zone For further information regarding marine park zoning please refer to publications on the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority (GBRMPA) website: http://www.gbrmpa.gov.au/

Lineage

Maintenance and Update Frequency: asNeeded

Statement: The zoning boundaries for each section were originally derived from gazetted descriptions, and in part from references to datasets produced by the Division of National Mapping, RAN Hydrographic Service. The dataset has subsequently had the following updates: - June 2000 to incorporate 12 new areas gazetted in August 2000, and to include Gumoo Woojabuddee Section (gazettal in January 1998). - January 2001 to incorporate 6 new areas gazetted in December 2000. - July 2001 to incorporate 10 new areas gazetted in July 2001. These new areas have all been referred to as 'Unzoned' areas of the marine park. - April 2002 to incorporate new Far Northern Zoning, accurate calculation of outer boundary geodesics (by placing intermedate vertices every 5km), and improved logical consistency with the physical datasets (see logical consistency). - July 2002 to reflect conversion of features (rocks, islands) less than 100m across to symbolised dataset, some corrections to zoning boundaries in Cairns section and around Hinchinbrook island. - November 2002, added polygon attribute ZONE and ZONE_No in the arc attribute table to permit colour coding of the arcs according to zoning. - March 2003 to include the new zoning provisions for the Gumoo Woojabuddee Section. The current zoning boundaries were generated using coordinates from the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Zoning Plan 2003, which came into effect on 1 July 2004. In 2009, voids within the dataset were examined against GBR Features and the 'Rocks' centroid dataset. Voids for 'Rocks' dataset were removed where necessary and extra voids made to coincide with updated GBR Features. Where zoning did not match updated GBR Features (less reefs and rocks), the zoning was pulled to match the relevant coastline.

Notes

Credit
Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority (GBRMPA).