New South Wales Consolidated Acts

CROWN LAND MANAGEMENT ACT 2016 - SECT 13.3

13.3 Entitlements over land with boundaries to lakes, rivers or roads

(1) The boundary of any land that is transferred by the Crown and is described or transferred in either of the following ways is taken to be the bank of the lake at the time of the Crown survey for the purposes of the transfer--

(a) as bounded by, by reference to, or by the margin or bank of, a non-tidal lake,

(b) by metes expressed or shown to run to a lake or to the margin or bank of a lake.

(2) Title to land comprising the bed of a non-tidal lake does not pass, and has never passed, by any transfer of land adjoining the lake--

(a) as bounded by, by reference to, or by the margin or bank of, the lake, or

(b) by metes expressed or shown to run to the lake or to the margin or bank of the lake.

Also, the owner of land transferred in that way is not entitled to any rights of access over, or to the use of, any part of the bed.

(3) The doctrine of accretion does not apply, and never has applied, to a non-tidal lake.

(4) The owner of land transferred under this Act, the Crown Lands Act 1989 or the Crown Lands (Continued Tenures) Act 1989 in either of the following ways is not entitled to any rights of access over, or to the use of, any part of the bed of the river--

(a) as bounded by, by reference to, or by the margin or bank of, a river,

(b) by metes expressed or shown to run to a river or to the margin or bank of a river.

(5) Subsection (4) does not apply to the owner of land sold under the Crown Lands (Continued Tenures) Act 1989 if the land--

(a) was, at the time of the sale, held as a conditional lease, homestead selection, homestead farm, week-end lease, conditional purchase lease, settlement purchase lease, closer settlement lease or group purchase lease under the Crown Land Acts, and

(b) was held as that holding before the bed of the adjoining river was reserved from sale or lease under the Crown Land Acts.

(6) The owner of the land is not entitled to any rights of access over, or to the use of, any part of the bed of a river if, before the commencement of section 172 of the Crown Lands Act 1989 --

(a) the bed of the river was reserved from sale or lease under the Crown Land Acts, and

(b) land adjoining the river was subsequently alienated (including alienation under any form of tenure under the Crown Land Acts or any other Act relating to the alienation of land of the Crown)--

(i) as bounded by, by reference to, or by the margin or bank of, the river, or

(ii) by metes expressed or shown to run to the river or to the margin or bank of the river.

(7) If any land is or was transferred by the Crown with a boundary adjoining, or as bounded by, a road created by the Crown, no part of the road passes, or is to be taken ever to have passed, with the land.

(8) This section does not affect any rights acquired under the Water Management Act 2000 .

(9) In this section--

"bank" means the limit of the bed of a lake or river.

"bed" means the whole of the soil of a lake or river including that portion--

(a) which is alternately covered and left bare with an increase or diminution in the supply of water, and

(b) which is adequate to contain the lake or river at its average or mean stage without reference to extraordinary freshets in time of flood or to extreme droughts.

"lake" includes a permanent or temporary lagoon or similar collection of water not contained in an artificial work.

"river" includes any stream of water, whether perennial or intermittent, flowing in a natural channel, and any affluent, confluent, branch or other stream into or from which the river flows.

"transferred" means sold, leased or disposed of in any other way under the Crown Land Acts or any other Act relating to the alienation of land of the Crown.