Opua ‘Masterplan’ soon to be unveiled
Organisations behind the communitydriven ‘Opua Masterplan’ will present their visions for the town and unveil the first development projects at a public meeting in the Opua Community Hall on Wednesday next week (June 10, starting 7pm).
All residents and anyone else with an interest in the development of the town will be welcome.
Love Opua, a community group established last year with the aim of making the town a better place to live, will outline its action programme, including a security initiative and a neighbourhood support network to combat crime.
Far North Holdings will provide updates on its plans for the second stage of its marina, including cultural aspects arising from its discussions with Ngati Manu and its hapu Te Uri Karaka and Te Uri o Raewera. It will also unveil details for a new a fitness trail, to be developed as a result of input from students at Opua School.
The Opua Business Association will give an update on its activities, and the Bay of Islands Vintage Railway Trust will outline its plans for the new Opua railway station and cycleway.
Kevin Milne ( Paihia police) and Deputy Mayor Tania McInnes will speak about the masterplan and how they see it contributing to the development of the town, while the organisers will describe how it will be developed and implemented on an on-going basis, and how people can contribute and become involved.
The event is being organised by Love Opua with the support of Far North Holdings and the other organisations involved in the development of the Opua Masterplan, a structured but evolving overview of what the community wants the town to look and feel like in the next 15 to 20 years.
“Nothing about the masterplan is set in stone,” Far North Holdings chief executive Andy Nock said, “but it does give the community a vision on which to base our plans and ideas, and a forum for people to become involved with building the Opua we’d all like to see in the future.”
Far North Holdings was working closely with Love Opua to develop the masterplan by pulling together the activities of all the organisations involved into a single forum, he added.
“It’s about identifying the commonlyheld visions that people have for our town, and then co-ordinating and maximising our limited resources to help turn these into reality,” Love Opua chairman Dr Brian Hepburn said. “Together we can achieve so much more than we can as individual organisations.”