River Dreams: The People and Landscape of the Cooks River by Ian Tyrrell

Book Description

Secondhand. Very good condition. Ex library copy with external stickers, protective plastic cover and stamps/stickers on inside pages. Minor wear to book corners and edges.

River Dreams reveals the complex history of the Cooks River in south-eastern Sydney — a river renowned as Australia’s most altered and polluted.

While nineteenth-century developers called it ‘improvement’, the sugar mill, tanneries, and factories that lined the banks of Sydney's Cooks River had drastic consequences for the health of the river. Local Aboriginal people became fringe dwellers, and over time the river became severely compromised, with many ecosystems damaged or destroyed.

Later, a large section was turned into a concrete canal, and in the late 1940s, the river was rerouted for the expansion of Sydney Airport.

While much of the river has been rehabilitated in recent decades by passionate local groups and government initiatives, it continues to be controversial, with rapid apartment development placing new stresses on the region.

River Dreams is a timely reminder of the need to tread cautiously in seeking to dominate or ignore our environment. (back cover)