Work eases flooding closures
Pupils didn’t miss as many days this year
Some youngsters might not be clapping, but the Northland Regional Council is pleased that Te Kura Taumata o Panguru students were able to spend almost an extra fortnight at school this year, compared with 2017, thanks to flood control work.
Flooding cost them 26 school days last year, compared with 17 floodrelated closures this year, thanks to work done by the council last summer.
As well as regular “nuisance” flooding of West Coast Rd, and the associated missing lessons for roughly 100 students, however, high-intensity rainfall events posed a much bigger and more serious risk to the area, group manager — environmental services Bruce Howse said.
Flooding and debris had caused massive damage in the area in the late 1990s, a similar incident in the Gisborne area in June attracting national attention when an estimated one million tonnes of debris, much of it scrap timber, branches and offcuts left behind after forestry felling, was swept on to properties near Tolaga Bay.
Last summer the council carried out a range of stream channel maintenance work, including vegetation clearance and gravel extraction, resulting in a marked reduction in nuisance flooding and greatly improved access to the school.
However, during consultation on its new longterm plan earlier this year, regional councillors had listened to public feedback on wider flooding issues at Panguru, subsequently agreeing to fund various work that otherwise may never have been undertaken.
The council was now working with its Far North District counterpart with a focus on West Coast Rd flooding, including plans to raise the road by roughly one metre. The $440,000 NRC works programme, which would be completed over the next two years, would also include culvert upgrades to offset any potential stopbanking effect that raising the road could have on upstream properties.
“Otengi Rd will also be raised by about 50cm, and a series of other works, including benching the Whakarapa Stream floodway, should enable it to contain a once in a decade-type flood, instead of the regular flooding currently experienced,” Mr Howse said.
A section of the left streambank downstream of Otengi Rd would be lowered to allow floodwaters to flow into the Coastal Marine Area and estuary, and again, away from West Coast Rd.
As part of the LTP consultation, Northland ratepayers had given their blessing to a multi-milliondollar, decades-long investment that would see muchneeded improvements to critical flood protection infrastructure across the region, he added.
Panguru would be an early beneficiary of that, with the full cost of flood works there to be met by a new regional flood infrastructure rate (FIR) implemented through the LTP.
“Because the total value of this project is less than $500,000, and a targeted rate would raise less than $100,000 annually, it’s more costeffective and efficient to simply fund all the work for smaller, but locally important, projects like this from the FIR, rather than relying on a targeted local rate,” he said.
Elsewhere in Northland, and for planned works costing more than $500,000, the council had implemented a 70/30 funding regime, with 70 per cent to be funded by ratepayers Northland-wide via the FIR, leaving 30 per cent to be met by the affected community.
Spreading 70 per cent of an estimated $24 million worth of work across the region over all ratepayers over the next 60 years also meant the work would be paid for by the multiple generations, and reflected the broader regional benefits of better protecting the main service hubs.