I recently heard about the prospects of a new artificial reef near Torquay. First thoughts were why? The place is covered with natural reefs.
But with further reading, it appears that it does create extra habitats for fish, and greater fish numbers. I'm not even a fisherman, but I do like to eat fish... I figure it is just a variation on farming in the sea... Like adding fertilizers to the land, farming on land... This is actually a variation of sea farming... I like the concept...
At $1M, it's not that bad... More fish for ever! I've seen worse examples of dropping $1M. For example, I am working on about $1,000M worth of projects so the East Coast Crew can have gas at their houses in the future... In other gas fields... Long term... $50B+++ off shore in WA and similar for Qld on shore. The lucky country... Even though it has become expensive.
I reckon $1mil may be cheap, but the surfers and windsurfers would do it for free.
I could think of a few places I wouldn't mind building one!
Lots of free car / truck tyres and a big boat to drop them off.
Bring it owwwn 
When I lived in South Australia I helped build a few artifical reefs. Dived in one place the week before work started, then the week after. Even in that short time fish had moved in!
Sometimes we would swim inside an old car with the windows down and wind the windows up while there were fish inside too. Kind of like being inside an underwater aquarium. 
Another use for the reefs was for 'harvesting' boat anchors. It's amazing how many anchors can get stuck on the reef and then have to have the rope cut because there was no way of freeing it (from the surface). Even anchors rigged to 'trip' can still get stuck. I bought one anchor when I bought my boat, have never bought another since. 
So mark I think the world is overpopulated are you saying I can 
not hold this opinion unless I do the right thing and top myself?
yep everyone dump your scrap steel and tyres in the ocean and save the fish or we could produce concrete blocks to do the same thing
Charter fishing operators in & around Melbourne have been creating 'artificial reefs' for a while now over 'baron' areas to attract fish...old fridges, wheels, car bodies. Constantly dump over a few years & keep the gps coordinates - win-win for the operator.
As you mentioned though Simondo - Torquay is all natural reefs, surely they wouldn't put one off the main beach to lure the surfers back from Jan-Juk?
They also said they were putting one off altona. Maybe like the concrete dome ones on the eastern side. the torquay one i think was going to be a steel girder type
