Carving up the coastline

Forest and Bird, Issue 292, 1 May 1999, Page 20

Carving up the

coastline

Housing development 15 surrounding Tairua Harbour on the Coromandel

Increasing coastal subdivision threatens wildlife, plants, and scenery, according to JO MACKAY ubdivision is fast eroding the scenic values of our northern coastline — forever. A simple bach by the sea is a common New Zealand dream. Yet, in the north particularly, population pressure and rising affluence (amongst some) is leading to subdivision of every spot of coastline with a view. Professor Terry Healy, of Waikato University’s Coastal Marine Group, worries that there is very little ‘coastline of nature left — where the artefacts of construction are not evident. His concern is that coastal subdivision is knee-capping our potential future income from tourism. "Many tourists come here because of our so-called "clean green" image, and the coastline is a big part of that, he says. Under sections 5 to 7 of the Resource Management Act, local authorities are supposed to take consideration of the ‘preservation of natural character. However, Professor Healy believes it will take an Environment Court case to set a precedent before councils pay attention to landscape values. Rodney District, just north of Auckland, is expecting a 40 percent increase in population over the next two decades, and subdivision is rampant along its eastern coast. This will be encouraged by a planned motorway extension to Puhoi. Further north, the coastline is also filling up. In the Coromandel, an Aucklanders’ playground, there is scarcely a patch of "buildable’ beach that is not covered in houses. Developers are currently seeking consents for a large marina at Coromandel, which will involve dredging a canal into the harbour. At Whitianga another developer is seeking to dredge a channel up a harbour arm, to turn 220 hectares of farmland into an extensive canal suburb, providing water frontage to several hundred sections. In the upper part of Tairua harbour, a developer has gained consent to create an ‘international golfcourse’ along a stream just back from the coast, comprising about 150 sections. As Warren Stace, senior planner for Environment Waikato, lists these pro-

posed developments, he comments: ‘Natural character is supposed to be taken into account, but once development is underway it’s very hard to do so. Quiet Ohiwa harbour, a very shallow, tidal estuarine environment, is tucked away behind Ohope in the eastern Bay of Plenty. In 1996, Forest and Bird members mounted a fierce campaign to protest against, and finally throw out, developers’ plans to build a canal housing development in Ohiwa’s western arm. ‘It would have meant dozens of sections and jetties in the upper reaches of the harbour; bright lights, boats, says then-resi-dent and local Forest and Bird chairperson, Helen Harrison. The area is largely tranquil mudflats, two-thirds of it less than two metres above the high water mark, with one mound sacred to Maori. The site would have required extensive alteration. ‘We decided it was totally inappropriate. she says. The campaign raised a record 507 submissions opposing the applications for development, brought in expert witnesses to the application hearings, and with the support of the local iwi, Te Whakatohea, succeeded in having the application thrown out. It was a victory Helen Harrison and the others were proud of. But early this year, the council gave approval for a conventional subdivision to be built in the same place. The harbour won't be as affected, there won't be dredging nor a canal dug through a reserve as in the original application, but the quiet is gone forever. At best, environmental impacts can be mitigated by careful planning. The coastal marine group at Waikato University did a lot of early work to establish formulae for determining ‘setback zones’ for subdivisions, to protect fragile dunes, especially around the Bay of Plenty.

As a result, some coastal subdivisions such as at Waihi Beach, Papamoa, and Pukahina beach, avoided the mistake of building upon unstable sand. Setback zones are calculated on known erosion rates, short-term episodic-erosion rates, potential sea-level rise, and the topographic factors of dunes. nn Graeme, Kiwi Conservation Club coordinator for the Bay of Plenty, has witnessed everincreasing habitat threats in coastal areas because of subdivision. ‘New Zealand wildlife used to get by because there weren’t very many people, and there were a whole lot of unused places, she says. ‘But now people go to the secret places, which aren’t secret anymore. Beach-breeding birds are particularly at risk. Ann and Basil Graeme have recorded a steady decline in New Zealand dotterel numbers around the Bay of Plenty and Coromandel since they began monitoring them in the early 1980s. Variable oystercatchers are also beseiged. Reserves are no great protection for these birds. The tip of the subdivided spit at Matarangi on the eastern Coromandel has been set aside as a bird refuge — but that doesn’t stop 4WDs driving along the sand, nor people surfcasting along the beach. ‘When you get people close to a place, their effects spill over, says Ann. Basil Graeme also points out that lowprofile, remnant, lowland fish populations, which have managed to survive in farm drains after their habitat was drained, are now being wiped out when drains are covered over for residential development. It takes ongoing and committed actions from locals to help wildlife survive. At Omaha, on the Rodney coast near Warkworth, Laura and Jim McKinlay have started an intensive predator control pro-

gramme which in 1997 enabled their small local population of New Zealand dotterel to fledge chicks for the first time in eight years. They have also succeeded in enthusing other locals to look out for the birds: now people rarely walk their dogs along the beach in breeding season, for example. The story of Omaha, a beautiful sandspit just south of Leigh, is typical of many other subdivision developments. It has its share of past planning catastrophes. The most spectacular was a huge, expensive, infilled seawall, almost half a kilometre long and about five metres high which was built to protect houses built right along the water's edge. Large storms ripped out the sand and swept away all signs of the wall — and the front row of houses had to go. With consultation required under the Resource Managment Act, the latest plans for subdivision of the southern part of the spit are far more environmentally friendly, says Jim McKinlay. The consultant for this, Boffa Miskell, has accepted several Forest and Bird proposals. The company has left a wider coastal protection zone, and proposes to build wooden walkways and fence the dunes to protect the muehlenbeckia. It also proposes to create a buffer zone, of a strip of manuka, as a windbreak to a small kahikatea swamp forest (the last of its type in Rodney District), and to fence the remnant forest. It is recording the swamp’s watertable, and has measures in place to feed in water if the level drops. Omaha is covered in archaeological sites and Boffa Miskell has allowed for a Ngati Wai representative to be present at excavations in case sensitive material is unearthed. Local councils can be the ‘piggies in the middle’ of some environmental messes caused by past developments. The Western Bay of Plenty District Council is under pressure to rectify the mistakes of the past at Waihi Beach. Planner Philip Martelli says coastal erosion has been exacerbated by creek realignment from the 1930s, and properties are now at risk as a result — and there’s debate about how to protect them. ‘The pressure comes where you have dynamic or unstable coastlines and it’s subdivided right up to the beach — it changes the character of the beach. In some areas sea walls have gone in and changed the nature of the beaches.’ hilip Martelli says the issue of coastal is two-fold: firstly, should more subdivision be allowed, and secondly, what are the environmental effects of further development on already subdivided areas? His council is not zoning any more coastal areas residential, ‘which puts quite a lot of pressure on existing zoned areas. And

simple little baches are now being replaced by spacious resource-hungry holiday homes. ‘A major issue is that the more substantial the dwellings are, the more pressure there is from ratepayers to protect them from erosion, says Philip Martelli. Population, mobility, leisure time, money: these things are difficult to fight against, and the weapons in the conservationists’ armoury are not strong. As many local Forest and Bird branches know, the ability of conservationists to counter the worst effects of development depends upon the slant of local council district plans. The popular Kapiti Coast just north of Wellington is regarded as having a ‘prodevelopment’ council. The one small patch of coastline not developed is adjacent to a nationally significant scientific reserve at Waikanae River. Local environmental groups, including Forest and Bird, are currently appealing the council’s approval of developers’ plans, seeking to lessen their negative impact on the reserve. Issues of equal access to our beaches, when coastal properties are fetching astronomical prices out of the reach of most New Zealanders, have not even been touched on in this article, but are also a concern. It is said, for example, that in the outer Bay of Islands, coastal land development is making access to the coast more difficult for locals. Conservationists around the rest of the country need to be aware that it may only be a matter of time before population pressure moves into other areas. We need to constantly defend the value of natural scenery and protect coastline habitats around the country — before it’s a case of protecting the last

remnants around the rest of New Zealand’s coastline, as in the north.

JO MACKAY is a freelance writer based in Wellington, with a particular interest in conservation, and botany.