AUSTRALIA ONLY 2 PEOPLE LIVING RESIDENT IN COSSACK TOWN IN PILBARA REGION OF WESTERN AUSTRALIA NOW GHOST TOWN WHICH WAS ONCE A MINING BOOM AREA AND WESTERN AUSTRALIA HAS 87 GHOST TOWNS COMPARED WITH 75 IN REST OF AUSTRALIA AND MORE INTERESTINGLY GOVT HAS PUT 8000 SOLDIERS IN TOWNSVILLE GUARDING GREAT BARRIER REEF BUT ONLY 30 PERSONNEL TO GUARD TRILLION DOLLARS WORTH OF INVESTMENT IN NORTH WEST Julie Power Published: August 31, 2014 - 12:13AM Hayley Bringdal and Ian Able are the only living residents of the ghost town of Cossack in Western Australias Pilbara region. As caretakers, they oversee what is left of the birthplace of the states pearling industry, dating back to 1865. Their days are filled with caring for the old towns buildings, and looking after a few overnight visitors to the once bustling town. They wont rule out the presence of phantoms of the pearly past because somebody might want to put on a ghost walk to attract more visitors, Ms Bringdal said with a laugh. WA has 87 ghost towns, most of them former mining centres, compared with 75 in the rest of Australia. More could join Cossacks ranks if the Pilbara doesnt diversify beyond iron ore and natural gas by adding more infrastructure to sustain other businesses, a report says. Co-author Jemma Green says Cossack is a perfect example of a monoculture that failed to diversify. It doesnt matter what the underlying mono-sector is. If it doesnt develop secondary and tertiary industries, then all that will be left is a caretaker. Case in point, Ms Green says. The Pilbara is the region that has won the lottery twice, the report says, with the discovery of iron ore in the 1950s and natural gas in 1971. It generates 5.5 per cent of Australias gross domestic product, the report says. The mining boom led to a 42 per cent growth in population between 2006 and 2011; a doubling of average salaries to about $1543 a week, and a 407 per cent rise in rents in Karratha. Now investment is slowing and the number of fly in, fly out workers has dropped. Not all lottery winners stay rich, the report warns. Many towns and regions in the world, such as Detroit in the US, have lived and died by one product, thinking anything but success seemed an impossibility until they failed, in Detroits case after the decentralisation of the car industry. While much had been done to increase the regions infrastructure – new schools, playgrounds and marinas – the area is still in catch-up mode. A particular problem for industry is the lack of affordable transport and power, said Ms Green, a research fellow at Curtin Universitys sustainability policy Institute. Certainly Karratha and Port Hedland could have viable futures, because there is so much infrastructure there already, she said, but the elephant in the room was the absence of an electricity grid that could make rail transport more affordable. The railways are owned by individual mining companies, with little sharing of resources, and the engines run on diesel. If they were to get that right, there is huge potential for the Pilbara to be the food bowl of Asia, Ms Green said. Pilot projects, such as the Aurora Algae biotechnology project in Karratha, were being abandoned because the costs were too high. What is really missing, and what weve tried to highlight in the report, is the need for critical infrastructure which will facilitate and allow economic diversification, she said. Only last month, Karratha officially became WAs newest city. Mayor Peter Long, a resident of the area for 30 years, who has seen booms and busts, said he was trying to make the town more resistant to the whims of the commodity industry. Mining would always be the mainstay of the area, but the city was looking at different types of aquaculture and agriculture, expanding tourism, and bringing government services and defence back to the area. Opening the first public port would help other industries, he said. Despite a trillion dollars worth of investment, the Pilbara had no defence capability, Mr Long said. He had been lobbying to get several hundred army personnel based in the region and two naval vessels to protect these investments. There are 8000 [soldiers] in Townsville guarding the Great Barrier Reef, and you have 30 [personnel] guarding a trillion dollars worth of investment throughout the north-west, he said. In Cossack, the new caretakers act as informal tourist guides, answering questions about its past, and helping shape the old towns future as a tourist destination. You cant escape [history] when you are walking around a town where all the buildings are a hundred-plus years old, Mr Able said.
Posted on: Sun, 31 Aug 2014 03:20:45 +0000