Research Series Part Two :
The Architecture of Coastal Displacement.
Bunurong Country, Port Phillip Bay and Environmental Evacuation.

Bunurong Country.

Dana Moussaoui

Building upon the discussion of evacuation on Wurundjeri Country, this paper examines the coastal and environmental mechanisms through which Bunurong people were displaced from the shoreline and wetlands of Port Phillip Bay.

While settler-colonial dispossession and evacuation have been analysed largely in urban contexts, Bunurong Country demonstrates how spatial displacement also occurred through environmental restructuring, resource extraction, and the imposition of coastal infrastructure. Colonial settlement disrupted kinship-based management of tidal lands, shellfish beds, and intertidal zones, replacing sustainable practices with fenced estates, ports, and market-driven fisheries (Pascoe, 2014; Broome, 2005). These interventions, framed as economic development or public improvement, enacted a form of environmental evacuation, where First Nations peoples were gradually removed from areas critical to survival, social life, and cultural knowledge transmission.

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Bunurong coastal Country, stretching from the Mornington Peninsula to western Port Phillip Bay, was historically structured around mobility, seasonal camps, and intergenerational knowledge of tidal cycles, shellfish harvesting, and freshwater access. Early colonial settlement disregarded these practices, enforcing fences, grazing, and urban expansion that fragmented the landscape and prevented traditional use (Attwood, 2003). Port infrastructure, particularly in Melbourne and Williamstown, further encroached on vital coastal spaces, systematically excluding Bunurong communities from the shorelines that had supported generations. Spatial displacement was therefore embedded in both hard infrastructure and soft governance mechanisms, such as licensing, resource control, and restricted mobility.

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Architectural and planning decisions compounded this displacement. Town planning around Melbourne’s emerging coastal suburbs prioritised property speculation, recreation, and tourism over community continuity, often romanticising the “wild” or “untamed” coast while erasing Indigenous presence (Jacobs, 1996; Dovey and Pafka, 2020). Roads, seawalls, and residential developments reconfigured tidal and estuarine landscapes, creating environments inhospitable to traditional subsistence practices and cultural activities. Evacuation was therefore not only physical removal but ecological and infrastructural exclusion, a process whose impacts are still evident in coastal urban morphology and public access patterns.

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The legacies of environmental evacuation continue in contemporary planning and architectural practice. Coastal redevelopment, marina expansion, and high-density beachfront housing place pressure on both ecological systems and communities, often replicating historical patterns of exclusion. In Bunurong Country, this manifests as restricted access to culturally significant sites, erosion of intergenerational knowledge, and economic marginalisation (Victorian Government, 2024). Architecture and urban design remain central to these dynamics: the siting, form, and governance of coastal structures continue to determine who may occupy, utilise, or benefit from the land.

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Practising architecture with awareness of these histories requires engagement with Bunurong knowledge holders as spatial authorities, recognition of the environmental traces of evacuation, and a commitment to prioritising continuity of place over abstract aesthetic or economic imperatives. Architects must confront the reality that much of the urbanised coast is built upon landscapes from which First Nations peoples were systematically removed. Ethical practice, therefore, entails not only acknowledgement of these histories but also active collaboration, ecological restoration, and design that facilitates community reconnection to Country.

Coastal evacuation on Bunurong Country underscores the broader principle that displacement is both environmental and infrastructural. It is the combined effect of legal exclusion, urbanisation, and ecological disruption that shapes the possibilities for cultural continuity. Architecture, planning, and environmental design are implicated in these processes and bear responsibility for whether they reproduce patterns of removal or contribute to repair and relational justice.

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The study of Bunurong Country demonstrates that evacuation is not confined to urban interiors or housing estates but is a continuum of settler-colonial spatial control, extending across coastlines, wetlands, and tidal lands. By understanding these dynamics, architectural practice can begin to address the structural and environmental forces that have displaced First Nations communities and design with accountability, continuity, and recognition of Indigenous authority over land and water systems.

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References (Harvard style)

Attwood, B. (2003) Rights for Aborigines. Sydney: Allen & Unwin.

Broome, R. (2005) Aboriginal Victorians: A History Since 1800. Sydney: Allen & Unwin.

Dovey, K. and Pafka, E. (2020) ‘The urban politics of displacement’, Urban Studies, 57(1), pp. 1–18.Jacobs, J.M. (1996) Edge of Empire: Postcolonialism and the City. London: Routledge.

Pascoe, B. (2014) Dark Emu. Broome: Magabala Books. Victorian Government (2024) Closing the Gap Annual Report. Melbourne: State of Victoria.

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