This article lists the sites registered with World Heritage in Australia.
Understand
Listing
| Site | Type | Criterion | Description | Drawing | |||||||||||||||||||||
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| Opera Sydney | Cultural | (i) | Opened in 1973, the Sydney Opera House is one of the major architectural works of the XXe century. It combines various innovative trends both from the point of view of architectural form and structural design. A magnificent urban sculpture carefully integrated into a remarkable coastal landscape at the tip of a peninsula jutting out into Sydney Harbor, this edifice has since its construction exercised a great influence on the world of architecture. The Sydney Opera House is made up of three arched and intertwined clusters of 'shells' that house the two main performance venues and a restaurant. The “shells” arranged on a vast platform are surrounded by terraces which serve as pedestrian walks. In 1957, the decision of an international jury to entrust the construction of the Sydney Opera House to Danish architect Jørn Utzon symbolized the desire to adopt a radically new approach to construction. | | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Royal Exhibition Building and Carlton Gardens | Cultural | (ii) | The Royal Exhibition Center and surrounding Carlton Gardens were designed for the major international exhibitions of 1880 and 1888 in Melbourne. The building and the grounds were designed by Joseph Reed. The building, built in brick, wood, steel and slate, amalgamates Byzantine, Romanesque, Lombard and Italian Renaissance features. This set is representative of the movement of international exhibitions. Between 1851 and 1915, more than 50 of them were organized in cities like Paris, New York, Vienna, Calcutta, Kingston (Jamaica) and Santiago de Chile, on the basis of a common principle and objective: take stock of progress by showing the achievements of all countries. | | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Australian convict sites Kingston and Arthur`s Vale Historic Area Old Government House and Domain Hyde Park Barracks Brickendon and Woolmers Estates Darlington Probation Station Old Great North Road Female Factory waterfalls Port Arthur Historic Site Coal Mines Historic Site Cockatoo Island Convict Site Fremantle Prison | Cultural | (iv) (vi) | The property comprises a selection of eleven penitentiary sites, among the thousands established by the British Empire on Australian soil in the XVIIIe and XIXe centuries. The sites are scattered across the country, from Fremantle in Western Australia, to Kingston and Arthur's Vale on Norfolk Island in the east; and from the vicinity of Sidney, NSW, in the north, to sites in Tasmania, in the south. Nearly 166,000 men, women and children were sent to Australia for more than 80 years, between 1787 and 1868, sentenced by British justice to deportation to the penal colonies. Each of the sites had its own vocation, whether it was a question of punitive confinement or re-education through forced labor in the service of the colonial project. The property presents the best surviving examples of the large-scale deportation of convicts and the colonizing expansion of European powers through the presence and work of convicts. | | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Shark Bay, Western Australia | Natural | (vii) (viii) (ix) (x) | Located at the western end of the Australian mainland, Shark Bay, with its islands and surrounding lands, has three exceptional natural features: its vast seagrass beds, the most extensive (4 800 km2) and the richest in the world, its population of dugongs, or "sea cows", and its stromatolites, colonies of algae that build mounds and are among the oldest forms of life on earth. Shark Bay is also home to five endangered mammal species. | | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Ningaloo Coast | Natural | (vii) (x) | With an area of 604,500 hectares with marine and terrestrial features, the Ningaloo Coast, located on the remote coastline of Western Australia, includes one of the longest shore edge reefs in the world. On land, the place offers a limestone karst system and a network of caves and underground streams. The Ningaloo Coast sees annual gatherings of whale sharks and is home to many marine species, including a great diversity of sea turtles. The terrestrial part of the site is home to masses of groundwater in a network of caves, conduits and streams. There is a whole variety of rare species that contribute to the exceptional biodiversity of this marine and terrestrial site. | | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Australia’s Gondwana Rainforests In New South Wales Border Ranges National Park Limpinwood Nature Reserve Numinbah Nature Reserve Mount Nothofagus Flora Reserve Mount Warning National Park Nightcap National Park Washpool National Park Gibraltar Ranger National Park Iluka Nature Reserve New England National Park Dorrigo National Park Mt Hyland Nature Reserve Werrikimbe National Park Mt Seaview Nature Reserve Willi Willi NP Barrington Tops National Park Wilsons Peak Flora Reserve Mount Clunie Flora Reserve Amaroo Flora Reserve Fenwicks Scrub Flora Reserve Kerripit Beech Flora Reserve At Queensland | Natural | (viii) (ix) (x) | This site, which includes several protected areas, is found mainly along the Great Escarpment on the east coast of Australia. The exceptional geological features present around the craters of the shield volcanoes and the high number of rare and endangered species in this site are of international importance for science and conservation. | | |||||||||||||||||||||
| 1 Fraser Island | Natural | (vii) (viii) (ix) | Off the eastern coast of Australia, Fraser Island, 122 km, is the largest sand island in the world. Behind the beach are the majestic remains of large rainforests growing on the sand and half of the world's perched freshwater dune lakes. Its combination of still moving sand dunes, tropical rainforests and lakes make it an exceptional site. |  | |||||||||||||||||||||
| 2 Macquarie Island | Natural | (vii) (viii) | This island of 34 km long on 5 km wide is located in the Southern Ocean, 1 500 km south-eastern Tasmania and roughly halfway between Australia and the Antarctic continent. The island forms the exposed part of the Macquarie submarine ridge, uplifted where the Indo-Australian tectonic plate meets that of the Pacific. This is a site whose geological conservation is of major importance because it is the only place on the planet where rocks from the earth's mantle (6 km below the ocean floor) are actively exposed above sea level. Among these unique rocks are remarkable examples of cushion basalt and other extrusive rocks. |  | |||||||||||||||||||||
| 3 Heard and MacDonald Islands | Natural | (viii) (ix) | Heard and McDonald Islands are located in the Southern Ocean, approximately 1 700 km of the Antarctic continent and 4 100 km southwest of Perth. As the only active subantarctic volcanic islands, they provide a true "window to the depths of the earth" and provide opportunities to observe ongoing geomorphic processes as well as ice dynamics. As one of the few pristine island ecosystems in the world, Heard and McDonald Islands are of particular conservation value due to the complete absence of exotic plants and animals as well as human impact. |  | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Lord Howe Island | Natural | (vii) (x) | Remarkable example of isolated oceanic islands, born from underwater volcanic activity of more than 2 000 m deep, these islands have spectacular topography and are home to many endemic species, especially birds. | | |||||||||||||||||||||
| The Great Barrier | Natural | (vii) (viii) (ix) (x) | In the north-east of the Australian coast, the largest coral complex in the world offers, with its 400 species of corals, its 1,500 species of fish and its 4,000 species of molluscs, a spectacle of variety and beauty. extraordinary and of high scientific interest. It is also the home of endangered species, such as the dugong and the great green turtle. | | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Purnululu National Park | Natural | (vii) (viii) | Purnululu National Park (239 723 Ha), located in the state of Western Australia, contains the deeply indented Bungle Bungle, composed of Devonian quartz sandstone eroded for 20 million years. What remains is a set of turrets and cones in the shape of beehives with steep flanks, the surface streaked with horizontal bands of dark gray crust of cyanobacteria (unicellular photosynthetic organisms). These exceptional examples of sandstone cone karst owe their existence and uniqueness to the interplay of several geological, biological, climatic and erosion phenomena. | | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Blue mountains region | Natural | (ix) (x) | The Blue Mountains region covers 1.03 million hectares formed by limestone plateaus, gorges and escarpments dominated by temperate eucalyptus forests. The site, which includes eight protected areas, is distinguished by its representation of the evolutionary adaptation and diversification of eucalyptus trees on the Australian continent in post-Gondwana isolation. The Blue Mountains region, which has 91 eucalyptus taxa, is also remarkable for the exceptional structural and ecological diversity of its eucalyptus trees associated with a wide range of habitats. The site offers a good illustration of Australia's biological diversity with 10% of its vascular flora and a large number of rare or threatened species, including endemic and relict species, such as the Wollemi pine (wollemia noblis), which subsist in extremely small microsites. | | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Australian Mammalian Fossil Sites (Riversleigh / Naracoorte) | Natural | (viii) (ix) | Riversleigh and Naracoorte, respectively in the north and south of South Australia, are among the ten most important fossil sites in the world. They beautifully illustrate the key stages in the evolution of unique Australian wildlife. | | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Wet tropics of Queensland | Natural | (vii) (viii) (ix) (x) | This region, which stretches along the northeastern coast of Australia, consists primarily of tropical rainforests. This biotope offers a particularly complete and varied sample of plants, marsupials and songbirds, as well as rare and endangered plant and animal species. | | |||||||||||||||||||||
| 4 Uluṟu-Kata Tjuṯa National Park | Mixed | (v) (vi) (vii) (viii) | This park, which was once called Uluru National Park (Ayers Rock-Mount Olga), features spectacular geological formations that dominate the vast sandy plain of central Australia. The huge Uluru Monolith and the rock domes of Kata Tjuta, west of Uluru, are an integral part of the traditional belief system of one of the world's oldest human societies. The traditional owners of Uluru-Kata Tjuta are from the indigenous Anangu people. |  | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Kakadu National Park | Mixed | (i) (vi) (vii) (ix) (x) | The park constitutes a unique archaeological and ethnological reserve in the world because the lands on which it extends have been permanently inhabited since 40,000 years. Remains from hunters and fishermen from the Neolithic to the aborigines who still inhabit it in the 20th centurye century, it presents a history of techniques and behavior illustrated by paintings and pictograms. It is the best example of a set of ecosystems, from intertidal leaves to plateaus, through flood plains and lowlands, habitats of a large number of rare or endemic species of flora and from wildlife. | | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Willandra Lakes Region | Mixed | (iii) (viii) | In this region are found the fossilized remains of a series of Pleistocene lakes and dunes, as well as archaeological evidence of human occupation from 60,000 to 45,000 years. It is a unique milestone in the history of human evolution on the Australian continent. Several well-preserved giant marsupial fossils have also been found in the area. | | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Tasmanian Wilderness Area | Mixed | (iii) (iv) (vi) (vii) (viii) (ix) (x) | In a region that has suffered from severe glaciations, these parks and reserves, with their deep gorges, which cover an area of more than one million hectares, constitute one of the last areas of temperate rainforest in the world. The remains found in the limestone caves bear witness to the occupation of the region for more than 20,000 years. | | |||||||||||||||||||||
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