Hopes raised for private vehicle access to Kaikoura
Private vehicle access to Kaikoura is looking more hopeful as residents cope with limited petrol supplies and other shortages.
Kaikoura Civil Defence yesterday started taking registrations from people with rugged 4WDs or trucks who want to join a managed convoy on the inland road when road conditions allow.
The move boosted hopes the road will soon be usable by private vehicles going in and out of Kaikoura.
The Kaikoura District Council yesterday also started a free bus service to encourage residents to save petrol.
Economic Development Minister Stephen Joyce arrived in Kaikoura with the good news the Government had decided to extend its $7.5 million assistance package to businesses with under 20 employees to those with more than 20.
He also promised the Government would work with the Kaikoura council to dredge the South Bay Harbour so boats such as those used by Whale Watch could get back into action.
Civil Defence controller Murray Sinclair said he didn’t know when the convoys would start but it would be one way and limited to 20 vehicles.
‘‘There will be no return convoys until the inland road has been reopened to private vehicles.
‘‘Again, we do not know when this will be. We can’t guarantee that a convoy will leave each day. This is to avoid delaying the essential repair work and slip stabilisation work that contractors are carrying out.’’
The local state of emergency in place in Canterbury for the past week has been extended for another seven days.
Work on the blocked portion of State Highway 1 was believed to be happening with helicopters using monsoon buckets to sluice loose material from the slips over the road near Goose Bay.
Also yesterday Spark restored all mobile services to the region.
The distribution of chemicals for chemical toilets started yesterday, but residents are warned there won’t be enough for all toilets. Another military convoy bringing essential supplies, including fuel, arrived in Kaikoura yesterday. It contained 14 specialist vehicles, including four fuel tankers.
Water use restrictions in the town continue. Workers are still battling to get water to South Bay.
The council tally of red stickered buildings now stands at 36, yellow 120, and white 981.
The Ministry for Social Development said 487 people had applied for earthquake-related assistance in Kaikoura, Marlborough and the Hurunui District.
So far grants totalling $120,000 had been paid out, with an average grant size of $250.
Building a new inland highway to connect the upper South Island to Christchurch is ‘‘not out of the question’’ but could cost about $4 billion, a Wellington mapping company believes.
Critchlow Limited founder Steve Critchlow said the company, which employs 25 staff, had modelled what might be involved in upgrading the Molesworth Station track into a new route, for its own curiosity.
‘‘We are promoting the fact we have got a really detailed map of the New Zealand transport system.’’
The route would require 180 kilometres of new state highway but the price tag was just a ‘‘rule of thumb’’ based on construction costs in the United States, he said.
New Zealand’s wider high-tech mapping industry has been buzzing since the Kaikoura earthquake, which struck just two days before its annual awards.
Drones have been sent to survey slips, satellites assigned to provide extra aerial imagery and internet and hazard maps have been thrust into the limelight as the public and policy makers attempt to digest the consequences of the natural disaster.
‘‘The challenge is everyone is running around doing things they think are useful but coordination is always the problem,’’ Critchlow said. ‘‘Some small councils have got one person who is responsible for emergency management.’’
Prime Minister John Key last week cast doubt on whether damage to State Highway 1 would ever be repaired.
Critchlow said one of the issues would be the environmental consequences of dumping millions of tonnes of rock from slips into the ocean, ‘‘although if the road wasn’t there it would have fallen into the ocean anyway’’.
‘‘The question for the Government is whether you want access down the coast, or inland, and how long it would take compared with clearing the rubble from the existing road.
‘‘Look how long Transmission Gully is taking and it is not a very long road. It does beg the question of why you wouldn’t just run a ferry to Lyttelton.’’
Upgrading the Molesworth Station route would cut 112km off the existing undamaged route between Blenheim and Christchurch, which runs via Lewis Pass, and would only be 33km longer than a restored coastal route, Critchlow said.
The maximum gradient on the Molesworth route reaches 1:10 on the south-bound descent into Hanmer Springs, but that is not as steep as Transmission Gully, he said.
Another drawback is the road climbs to about 1100 metres.
That would put it on a par with the alpine Desert Road which crosses North Island’s Central Plateau and which can be blocked by snowfalls.
The public road from Seddon that runs into Molesworth is ‘‘pretty rough’’, but could be sorted out, Critchlow said.
‘‘Then there is the section through Molesworth itself which is not too bad, runs along the river and is beautiful. And then there is the bit down to Hanmer before you are back on the state highway network.’’
NZ Tech chief executive Graeme Muller said spatial technology had played a large role in the rapid response to the earthquake, including Christchurch surveyors Eliot Sinclair, which used drones to survey and produce 3D models of a large landslide near Rotherham and a slip near Waiau for the Hurunui District Council.
Wellington company Aurecon also plans to use drones to generate 3D models of slips for Canterbury Civil Defence.