Flush with cash, council plans revamp
Marlborough is set to spend more than $2 million to cope with an increase of visitors putting pressure on its public toilets.
The Marlborough District Council is gearing up to invest $2.36m into the region’s public toilets, with nearly half possibly shouldered by the Government’s Tourism Infrastructure Fund.
The money will be used to build or upgrade facilities at several locations, including Blenheim, Picton and Havelock.
The Gallery Havelock volunteer Caryll Moffatt said it was important to keep toilets in the region up to date.
‘‘People won’t use [public toilets] if they think they’re dingy, [because] if they’re looking dingy, then they’re not considered to be a safe place,’’ the Havelock local said.
Some of the funds will be used to redevelop the public toilet block in Havelock, which sits opposite The Gallery Havelock, for $420,000.
‘‘They’re definitely well used at the moment, and a lot of our trade comes from people stopping to use the toilets who then might see something nice in the window and come across,’’ Moffatt said.
‘‘A redevelopment would probably make them more well used. It’s just getting a bit drab.’’
Havelock Community Association chair Cedric Seatter agreed, saying the toilets were showing their age, and the signage was ‘‘not that crash hot’’.
On the other side of Marlborough, in Ward, a Flaxbourne Cafe employee said the new $320,000 toilet block earmarked for the township would solve a great need.
She said truck drivers who travelled along State Highway 1 at night needed ‘‘a proper place to stop’’. Presently, drivers who visited the township outside business hours were forced to head to the Ward Domain.
‘‘The toilets at the domain area are terrible to use,’’ she said. ‘‘They’re old and gross, and noone wants to use them.’’
She suggested new toilets be installed at the new heritage centre site across from the cafe, along
SH1. ‘‘We would also need ones without electricity, because after the last earthquake we were cut off, so we’d need normal doors.’’
Figures from a recent independent annual survey showed toilet facilities ranked high on the council’s list of services, scoring a
74 per cent level of satisfaction –
16 per cent above the national average.