WYONG councillor Greg Best will try a Back to the Future move, producing a 29-year-old document he says scientifically supports his long but unsuccessful crusade for another permanent channel opening to the Tuggerah Lakes.
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Cr Best said he would ask the appropriate council officers to search the council's files for information concerning a second channel opening experiment by former council senior environmental head, the late John Bell.
Mr Bell used bulldozers to open another channel from the sea to Tuggerah Lakes a few hundred metres north of the existing channel in 1985 and submitted an extensive report to council to show the results of the experimental second channel opening.
"I've seen a newspaper report of the time which quoted Mr Bell as stating that there were many positive effects produced by the opening and no negatives," said Cr Best.
"The benefits included water clarity, improved recreational and commercial fishing and a greatly increased volume of dead seagrass and algae was taken to sea on each tidal movement by the second channel."
This second channel opening remains the only time an artificial opening to the sea (apart from works on the existing channel) had been made by the council, he said.
"What Mr Bell did worked and it [the creation of a large opening] was repeated on the June long weekend in 2007 when The Entrance channel through natural causes was widened to between 300 and 400 metres, admitting much greater volumes of water to the lakes.
"No properties were flooded and the environmental effects seemed most worthwhile."
Cr Best said another opening could be tried again with the use of geo-bags filled with sand that could be re-angled or removed as the conditions warranted.
"A second channel opening for a much longer period could determine scientifically what the results would be," he said.
Cr Adam Troy said he would also raise the issue at a council lakes community level.
