Clambering up the giant red monolith, also known as Ayers Rock, will be prohibited from October - in line with the wishes of the traditional Aboriginal owners of the land AFP |
Sydney (AFP) - A looming ban on climbing Australia's Uluru rock, intended to protect the sacred site from damage, has instead triggered a damaging influx of visitors, tourism operators said Friday.
Clambering
up the giant red monolith, also known as Ayers Rock, will be prohibited from
October -- in line with the wishes of the traditional Aboriginal owners of the
land, the Anangu.
But a rush
to beat the ban has led to a sharp increase in tourists and is causing its own
problems for the World Heritage Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park.
Families
arriving in campers vans and RVs are a particular problem, chief executive of
Tourism Central Australia Stephen Schwer told AFP.
"We
have got so much of one particular market coming, we don't have enough
infrastructure to handle the number of drive travellers."
While most
visitors are doing the right thing, camping venues in the area are at capacity
with advance bookings, leaving many less organised arrivals to set up
illegally.
"People
don't realise when they go off the road they are actually trespassing on
pastoral land, or Aboriginal land, or protected land," Schwer said.
"We
are getting people that are leaving their rubbish behind and lighting
fires," he added.
"Sadly,
people are also emptying their toilet waste out of their vans on what they
think is unpopulated land, but is actually private land."
In the 12
months to June 2019, more than 395,000 people visited the Uluru-Kata National
Park, according to Parks Australia, about 20 percent more than the previous
year.
Yet just 13
percent of those who visited also climbed the rock, the government agency said.
Tourism
operators say that Australian and Japanese tourists most commonly seek to climb
Uluru.
The
Aboriginal connection to the site dates back tens of thousands of years and it
has great spiritual and cultural significance to them.
"Since
the hand back of Uluru and Kata Tjuta to traditional owners in 1985, visitors
have been encouraged to develop an understanding and respect for Anangu and
their culture," a spokesperson for Parks Australia said.
"This
is reflected in the 'please don't climb' message," they added.
Lyndee
Severin from Curtin Springs station and roadhouse, one of just a few camping
venues within 100 kilometres of Uluru, said "the vast majority of people
are doing the right thing" but hundreds were setting up illegally by the
side of the road or down a bush track.
"So we
have some people that think that the rules don't apply to them," she told
AFP.
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