Bikers tear up eroding sand dunes
Every time Bevan Taylor treks Ka¯whia Ocean Beach, newly planted shrubbery has been ripped out by bikers along the sand dunes.
An increasing number of people are riding motorbikes over them, ignoring the signs.
It’s eating into the sand and hastening erosion caused by rising sea levels and storms, despite local efforts to remedy it.
Ka¯whia School kids and Onepu Charitable Trust have recently been planting along the dunes to prevent erosion.
But careless bikers are ripping up the ‘‘thousands of hours’’ of hard work, Taylor, who leads the Ka¯ whia Aotea Ocean Beach Care group, said. He doesn’t want a two-wheel vehicle ban to be enforced, but the town is running out of options.
Track marks tend to get worse and more frequent when school holidays hit.
‘‘They’re here,’’ Taylor said. ‘‘Twelve of them were ripping up the beach the other day.’’
Rapid erosion means Maketu Marae, right on the seashore, is at risk too.
‘‘They’ve been putting up [sea] walls, but it’s unravelling faster and faster now.
‘‘There’s a real concern from kauma¯ tua of Maketu, to get this sorted without delay.
‘‘Maketu will lose their marae if we don’t do something now.’’
The ecologically rich beach is renowned as one of New Zealand’s most beautiful, Taylor said.
Taylor even uses the beach to train his Muay Thai students. They regularly walk barefoot for 10 kilometres along the beach.
Taylor walks the beach six days of the week, stopping to educate anyone riding on the dunes.
‘‘It’s a lot of fun. But at the end of the day it’s extremely costly.
‘‘[They] might have gotten away with it before. Some of them might have even grown up with that culture. But it has to stop.’’