by Shane Sody
A mockup plan for a new championship golf course in Possum Park / Pirltawardli (Park 1 of your Adelaide Park Lands) has indicated a minimum tree canopy loss of 54%.
Images: (left) State Government; (centre and right): Peter Dalkeith Scott. Compilation: Channel Ten News
The course “design test” prepared by international golf course designer, Peter Dalkeith Scott, overlays the State Government’s requirements for longer, wider, fairways (for FIFO millionaire LIV golfers) onto a tree map showing the estimated 9,000 trees within your Park Lands forested golf courses.
Click on this image to see a higher-resolution, PDF document, (3.26 Mb)
Infrastructure Minister Tom Koutsantonis says he’ll resign if Mr Scott’s earlier estimate of tree loss (around 5,000 trees) later proves to have been accurate. Mr Koutsantonis has called such an estimate “a lie” but after more than six months developing plans behind closed doors, the Government so far has released no plans, no concept drawings, and no estimates of tree losses.
Mr Scott has hit back, laying out in detail how massive Park Lands tree losses would be inevitable and necessary, to fulfill the State Government’s stated aim to widen and lengthen 18 fairways to an elite championship golf course standard.
Mr Scott has told Channel Ten News that his design test (marked “Concept Only”) indicating a minimum tree canopy loss of 54% was produced after (in his words) being “called a liar, basically.”
Mr Scott is one of the speakers who’ve agreed to appear at our “Stop the Chop” community forum on Sunday 21 September; billed as “the consultation that the State Government doesn’t want you to have.”
On the invitation list for the Panel are (left to right): Kaurna Elder, Tim Agius; Planning Minister, Nick Champion, Lord Mayor, Jane Lomax-Smith; Member for Adelaide, Lucy Hood; Ecologist, Kathryn Hill; Golf course designer, Peter Dalkeith Scott; Executive Director, Doctors for the Environment, Dr Kate Wylie; and APA President, Sarah Russo.
At the time of writing (11 Sept 2025), acceptances had been received from six of these eight speakers. No response had been received from Mr Champion nor Ms Hood.
Booked out: but available on livestream
The forum (from 11am on Sunday 21 September) at the North Adelaide Community Centre, is booked out, having reached the capacity of the Centre’s large Hall.
What can you do if you still want to attend?
You can add your name to a Humanitix WAIT LIST. When any ticket-holders cancel or return their tickets, the returned tickets will be automatically offered to those on the wait list, in the order that they joined the wait list.
The other option is to view the event and react to it, through a video livestream, on the APA Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/AdelaideParkLandsAssn/
Your questions
Pic: Yuri Poetzel
Many of those who’ve booked for the community forum have submitted questions to be put to our panel. Here’s a sample:
Is the driving range proposed for J E Brown Park, also proposed to include car parking? If so, what are the implications of that for trees, wildlife and the amenity of the Park? (Jan Bowman)
Do you believe the number and size of trees contribute to our quality of environment? If yes, then why sacrifice established tree area and not make [a new] golf course on treeless ground? (Christine Hunter)
What is the survival rate of mass 'replacement' tree planting? (Liz Gourlay)
Why not develop underutilised/available land further from the city, where space for parking and crowds would be plentiful and far less disruptive? (Jackson Faulkner)
How does the plan to cut down trees align with the goal of increasing tree canopy in urban areas? (Andy Packer)
Three for one?
In recent interviews, Premier Peter Malinauskas has been repeating the Government’s promise that for every tree removed, three new ones would be planted. But three seedlings or saplings don’t make one mature tree. Shade, cooling, carbon storage and wildlife habitat take decades to grow.
A century-old sugar gum (Eucalyptus cladocalyx) off War Memorial Drive in Possum Park / Pirltawardli (Park 1). Three seedlings to replace it? A fair swap?
But don’t take our word for it. Read the South Australian Government’s own document: Seven Reasons to Protect Adelaide’s Mature Trees.
Top (banner) pic: Jan Bowman
The author of this article, Shane Sody, is the immediate Past President of the Adelaide Park Lands Association, and the editor of the semi-monthly newsletter, "Open Green Public".
Subscribe here.
https://adelaideparklands.m-pages.com/YWRrGW/adelaide-park-lands-assn-mailing
