A cliff made famous by a Korean pop star in the Blue Mountains will reopen to walk-in visitors only.
Lincolns Rock in Wentworth Falls was shut in late January due to safety concerns after 2,000 people visited the site per day during peak periods.
Hundreds of visitors were queuing along the soft sandstone to take the same photo K-pop singer Jennie Kim from Blackpink shared with millions of her Instagram followers in 2023.
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Re-enacting the picture became so popular that the section of rock where people sat had hollowed out from use.
Some tourists would also use the cliff-side location as a “toilet,” while some visited the front yards of nearby homes for the same purpose.
Visitors also clogged up the small streets off Hordens Road near the site with their cars, littered, and carved their names into the cliff top.
Lincolns Rock will remain closed to visitors until November. (Supplied: Blue Mountains City Council)
But Blue Mountains Mayor Mark Greenhill said he was confident opening the site with walk-in access only would reduce those behaviours.
“It helps us control the number of people going onto the rock — that’s the key issue,”
he said.
“If you give yourself the opportunity to literally count the number of heads walking in the gate and then closing the gate, then clearly you’re able to control the number of people going onto the site.”
Low visitor numbers
A report to the Blue Mountains City Council (BMCC) said almost 80 per cent of the 256 submissions made about managing tourism at the site supported a ‘low visitation’ plan.
In the short term, the small car park and bus bay at the site will remain closed while visitors walk in via Darwins Walk from Wilsons Park or other tracks at the end of Falls Road.
Scores of people would queue for a photo at the cliff’s edge. (Supplied: Facebook)
The council will restrict visitor parking for at least 1.5 kilometres from the site and limit where buses can drive.
BMCC staff will also be at the lookout to police visitor behaviour.
Councillor Greenhill said capping the number of visitors and encouraging a walk-in-walk-out principle alleviated the need to set up toilets and rubbish bins.
He said bathrooms alone would cost more than $1 million, which would make the site “unviable.”
Blue Mountains City Council Deputy Mayor Romola Hollywood and Mark Greenhill have consulted with the community about the future of Lincoln’s Rock. (Supplied: Romola Hollywood)
“The works you’d have to do to make the toilets environmentally appropriate would just be part of that enormous cost,” Cr Greenhill said.
The plan also ruled out setting up a fence along the cliff edge, thanks to reduced visitor numbers, and said people tended to jump similar barriers anyway, such as at Wedding Cake Rock in Sydney’s Royal National Park.
It said building that sort of infrastructure — including bathrooms, seating and bins — would “detract from the natural beauty of the place.”
Within three years, BMCC expects to build a pathway along the Tableland and Hordern Roads through grants and look at parking for guided tours.
Blue Mountains City Council staff will physically limit the number of people at the cliff to stop over tourism. (Supplied: Sean Ireland)
After that, the council will investigate opening the car park for bookings and expanding other parking locations in Wentworth Falls.
Closure encourages birds back
Gundungurra elder and custodian David King said the plan would promote sustainable tourism at the lookout.
“We want people to connect to country — we just don’t want country to pay for that joy,”
he said.
David King says birds have started to feed at the cliff top again since the lookout’s closure. (Supplied: Vera Hong Backbone Productions)
“It might sound like we’re trying to minimise tourism; we’re just trying to make sure country stays safe and strong.”
A report to council said staff and contractors had conducted “substantial” bush regeneration during the closure, including rehabilitating 1.2km of informal tracks made by visitors.
Mr King said he and the residents had seen birdlife return to the cliff side in recent months.
“I was out there yesterday and some beautiful [black glossy] cockatoos flew alongside of me,” he said.
“They were a lot further up than what they normally are, which is great.
Council staff and contractors have rehabilitated 1.2km of informal tracks made by tourists during the closure. (Supplied: Blue Mountains City Council)
“They have plants in that area that they eat — and so they’re feeling quite relaxed and comfortable, which gives me that sense of peace.“
The rock will be closed until at least December to allow council to budget and implement the short-term measures.
