Tallow Creek Floodplain

Tallow Creek is on the southern outskirts of Byron Bay. 

The Tallow Creek catchment stretches from the escarpment to the west and to the Pacific Ocean in the east.

Find out more about the characteristics of the Tallow Creek and view the Tallow Creek Floodplain studies, plans and entrance opening strategies.

Characteristics of the Tallow Creek Flood Plain:

• Size:450 hectares.
  Steep to undulating upper catchment which drains via three creeks (North, Middle and South Tallow Creek).
• The lower catchment is characteristic of ancient dune systems, with drainage lines running parallel to the coastline. The three creeks of the Tallow catchment drain to Tallow Lake, which drains to the ocean at Tallow Beach
• Suffolk Park has a fairly heavily developed urban catchment and is characterised as a flash flood catchment with minimal flood warning times.

Tallow Creek floodplain and the Arakwal National Park

A significant feature of the lower Tallow Creek catchment is the Arakwal National Park managed by the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS), which includes the Tallow Creek mouth.

The Tallow Creek mouth is an Intermittently Closed or Open Lake or Lagoon (ICOLL) and is intermittently open to the ocean. Opening of the mouth generally occurs by natural means, however, mechanical intervention has occurred in the past, in emergency situations.

As part of Council’s Local Environmental Plan process, Council's Climate Change Policy was updated with new current practice modelling parameters. The Tallow Creek Revised Flood Mapping document below reflects the results and the new mapping for Tallow Creek under LEP 2014.

Council has a permit from National Parks and Wildlife Service, Marine Parks and NSW Fisheries. The environmental assessment and Environmental Management Plan that supports this permit can be found below.