Lake Burbury is a man-made water reservoir created by the

Crotty Dam The Crotty Dam, also known during construction as the King Dam, or the King River Dam on initial approval, is a rockfill embankment dam with a controlled and uncontrolled spillway across the King River, between Mount Jukes and Mount Huxley ...

inundating the upper King River valley that lies east of the

West Coast Range The West Coast Range is a mountain range located in the West Coast, Tasmania, West Coast region of Tasmania, Australia. The range lies to the west and north of the main parts of the Franklin-Gordon Wild Rivers National Park. The range has h ...

. Discharge from the reservoir feeds the John Butters Hydroelectric Power Station, owned and operated by

Hydro Tasmania Hydro Tasmania, formerly the Hydro-Electric Commission (HEC), is a Tasmanian Government business enterprise which is the main electricity generator in Tasmania, Australia. Originally oriented towards hydro-electricity, owing to Tasmania's dr ...

. The reservoir was named in honour of

Stanley Burbury Sir Stanley Charles Burbury, (3 December 1909 – 24 April 1995) was an Australian judge. He served as Chief Justice of Tasmania from 1956 to 1973 and as Governor of Tasmania from 1973 to 1982, the state's first Australian-born governor. Early ...

, a former

Governor of Tasmania The governor of Tasmania is the representative in the Australian state of Tasmania of the monarch, currently King Charles III. The incumbent governor is Barbara Baker, who was appointed in June 2021. The official residence of the governor is Gov ...

Water source

The lake is fed mainly by rivers from the north, including the upper King River, and the Eldon River. Valleys that open to the area include the

Linda Valley Linda Valley is a valley in the West Coast Range (Tasmania), West Coast Range of Tasmania. It was earlier known as the Vale of Chamouni. It is located between Mount Owen, Tasmania, Mount Owen and Mount Lyell, Tasmania, Mount Lyell. Human settle ...

. It also has a natural lake just north of its northern shore known as

Lake Beatrice Lake Beatrice is a natural lake on the lower eastern side of Mount Sedgwick in the West Coast Range of Western Tasmania, Australia. Lake Beatrice is higher in altitude than the nearby Lake Burbury; however, it is not visible from that level, ...

which is at the eastern end of Mount Sedgwick. It has a surface area of .

Fishing

It is popular as a fishing lake, but is susceptible to extreme weather. Its feeder rivers are the upper

King King is a royal title given to a male monarch. A king is an Absolute monarchy, absolute monarch if he holds unrestricted Government, governmental power or exercises full sovereignty over a nation. Conversely, he is a Constitutional monarchy, ...

, Nelson, Princess, and Eldon Rivers. There are design features in the Crotty Dam to lower the surface level rapidly in the event of severe floodwaters. The lake has the "Bradshaw" bridge crossing it to connect the

Lyell Highway The Lyell Highway (Route A10) is a highway in Tasmania, running from Hobart to Queenstown. It is the one of two transport routes that passes through the West Coast Range, the other being the B28 Anthony Road. Name The name is derived fro ...

across it, and has two dams – one in the King River Gorge – the Crotty Dam, and the other adjacent to Mount Darwin, the

Darwin Dam The Darwin Dam is an offstream earthfill embankment saddle dam without a spillway, located in Western Tasmania, Australia. The impounded reservoir, also formed by Crotty Dam, is called Lake Burbury. The dam was constructed in 1990 by the Hyd ...

Inundation

The dam inundated the historical sites of the Darwin and Crotty – as well as the bridge of the

North Mount Lyell Railway The North Mount Lyell Railway was built to operate between the North Mount Lyell mine in West Coast Tasmania and Pillinger in the Kelly Basin of Macquarie Harbour. History At the start of the Twentieth century it was constructed to take o ...

over the King River which was not salvaged before the flooding. Significant portions of the

Kelly Basin Road Kelly Basin Road was a road built on the formation of the former North Mount Lyell railway line in the King River Valley of Western Tasmania. It ran to the east of the West Coast Range, from the Linda Valley, to Kelly Basin. Following the ce ...

are inundated as well. The Crotty Dam site had been surveyed in the early twentieth century but the proposed dam did not proceed at that time. It was re-visited in the 1980s and involved in the last major dam construction by Hydro Tasmania. Crotty Dam and Lake Burbury have been identified as "indicative places" on the (now defunct)

Register of the National Estate The Register of the National Estate was a heritage register that listed natural and cultural heritage places in Australia that was closed in 2007. Phasing out began in 2003, when the Australian National Heritage List and the Commonwealth Heri ...

Reserves

The lake lies to the west of the

Franklin-Gordon Wild Rivers National Park Franklin-Gordon Wild Rivers is a national park in Tasmania, 117 km west of Hobart. It is named after the two main river systems lying within the bounds of the park - the Franklin River and the Gordon River. Location The Franklin-Gordon Wi ...

and has a series of buffer zone conservation areas; the Princess River Conservation Area and the Crotty Conservation Area on the east shore, and the West Coast Range Regional Reserve on the west. The Hydro Tasmania jurisdiction of the lake is to the elevation (the full supply level being ) round the edge of the lake, as well as the island created by the impoundment. A

webcam A webcam is a video camera which is designed to record or stream to a computer or computer network. They are primarily used in Videotelephony, video telephony, live streaming and social media, and Closed-circuit television, security. Webcams can b ...

is located on the south east shore of the lake which looks across to where the Lyell Highway emerges from the Linda Valley and moves south around the eastern base of Mount Owen.http://anglersalliance.org.au/web-cams/lake-burbury-webcam/ – the webcam is supported by the Anglers Alliance Tasmania and the government http://www.ifs.tas.gov.au

References

External links

Hydro Tasmania information

Australian Heritage Database entry
{{Lakes of Tasmania, state=autocollapse Burbury West Coast Range King River power development scheme