Māpua Action Group

There are just 3 days left to have your say on the Navigation Safety Bylaw.
We urge you to comment on the draft, especially if you enjoy swimming/wharf jumping/diving at the wharf and swimming at Grossi Point.
Point 12.1 in the draft says this: “No person shall jump, dive, swim or undertake related activities, from: (a) within 50 metres of a landing place….”

Landing places are defined in the glossary of the draft as this: “jetty, dock, quay, landing, pile mooring, pier, pontoon, boat ramp, slipway or other facility, where vessels are moored or are launched or retrieved”.

If the bylaw goes through with this wording and the bylaw is enforced, swimming in Māpua village could become a thing of the past.

There is no mention in the draft of protecting bird and marine life from disturbance. This is a really important issue for the Waimea Inlet, where every year there are more jetskis exceeding the 5 knot speed limit and disturbing bird life.

A new threat to swimmers and birdlife are efoils, (electric surfboards) which can travel at speeds up to 62 kph/33.4 knots. Swimmers getting smashed by speedy eFoils is a concern as the water sport gets more popular. Last summer, Waikato Regional Harbourmaster saw increasing use of electric hydrofoil surfboards in the region and had some reports of close calls with swimmers.
“They're pretty quiet but they've got these big foils underneath that if they were to connect with somebody it's a significant injury coming or worse, so we just need to look at those as well. There are more eFoils around than before, and many people buy them “without any real understanding of the rules on the water”. - Chris Bredenbeck, Waikato Harbourmaster.
The Tasman navigation bylaw needs to include rules for efoils.

In our opinion, the bylaws is heavily weighted in favour of owners of powered vessels at the expense of the non-boating public and the environment.

Consultation closes 8pm Sunday September 1st.
Have your say! It’s easy…even if you just add comments on the map.

Navigation Safety Bylaw 2024 Share your feedback by 1 September on the proposed navigation safety bylaw.

Here is our submission on the boat ramp so far...

Māpua Boat Ramp

In response to the contentious issue of the boat ramp

We are opposed to the development of the Waterfront Park for a boat ramp and a new boat club building.

We support passive water activities at the Māpua wharf (and Waimea Inlet?) such as swimming, wharf jumping, fishing from the wharf, kayaking, paddle boarding, and all non motorized watercraft. We believe that these passive activities will no longer be possible if the boat ramp goes ahead in the Waterfront Park.

Tasman District Council rejected a proposal for a boat ramp in the Waterfront Park in 2017 … for the following reasons:

Marine health and safety issues:
Strong tidal currents in the area and the known build up of logs and flood debris in the eddy of the proposed boat ramp.

Proximity of the proposed ramp to the wastewater pumping station and main sewer and the gravity sewer located along the existing rock sea wall. If broken there would be significant contamination issues with raw sewage being directly discharged into the estuary.

The risk of toxic chemicals contained under the ground in the former Fruitgowers site leaching into the estuary as a result of soil disturbance in the building of the boat ramp.

Other reasons for rejecting the boat ramp:
The cost of the boat ramp to the ratepayers.
The expected problems with traffic and congestion impacting on the enjoyment of the area for other residents and visitors.

What has changed?
There are no new compelling arguments for building a boat ramp at this site but some new arguments against.

The Waterfront park is a council asset of the wider Māpua Community not principally the Tāmaha Sea Scouts and the Māpua Community Boating Trust.

This proposal has the ear of the council who have promised $700,000 to the Boating trust. However this is a project from a special interest group, the Māpua Community Boat Trust, and not in the interests of the wider community. We are concerned that the representation on the Māpua Waterfront Masterplan Working Group was skewed toward ensuring a boat ramp and building on the park. Marion Satherly, Mike Kinnimoth, Andrew Butler, are all members of the boat club and Amanda Brett a Tāmaha Sea scout leader. This working group does not represent views of the wider community.

The proposed boat ramp has divided the Māpua/Ruby Bay community. A household survey conducted by the Boat Club claimed that there was ‘wide community support’ for a boat ramp as evidenced by 87% of households they surveyed were in support. However the nature and construction of the survey question is not readily available and this survey was conducted by a group of people with an agenda to promote the boat ramp and buildings. It is difficult to accept the validity of this survey, it is not best practice for a vested interest group doing their own survey and supporting their views. It must be noted that the boat club numbers contradict the number of submissions to the council in 2017 where almost half the submitters were not in support of the waterfront boat ramp let alone a large building and carpark space.

The Māpua Trust has also teamed up with the Māpua Sea Scouts to Propose building an 800sqm building on public land ostensibly for the purpose of housing the Sea Scouts. This sounds laudable and community minded however we question the ‘need’ for Tāmaha sea scouts to have a new facility. They do not need a new facility or one of this magnitude. It is disproportionate to their use. I know this because my son was a sea scout for 5 years. Tides and currents on the estuary limit the use of small sail craft in the channel. Realistically, even with a new boat ramp, the sea scouts will still only occasionally sail in the channel due to tides and currents corresponding with availability of the scouts. They already have a serviceable and useful space on the domain and can still access the water when conditions align.

The original waterfront plan was a plan for all and approved by the community in 2017 for the long term plan 2018-2028. The plan had picnic tables, shade trees, a playground and an adult gym circuit.
By comparison the large scale nature of the current project is overwhelming and a cause for concern given the number of resource consents the current proposal is seeking

The impact on the village of a large boat ramp and accompanying car park and building will be considerable.

Loss of the tradition of ‘wharf jumping’ and fishing. Boaties will have to tie up at the wharf as the boat trailer is parked and then the driver must join the boat at the wharf. In the application proposal the applicants indicate that boaties will ‘wait’ to exit the channel by the boat ramp if there is a cue by tying up at the wharf.

Loss of greenspace and amenity value for the whole community. Instead of a large open space that everyone can use there will be gravel and cement car parks and a very large building (800 sqm) to be used by a few members of the community for a cost.

Congestion. Traffic assessment suggests there will be minimal disruption to regular flow of traffic at the wharf (CO7 appendix 6) and boat club members speculate on the current numbers of boats launched etc and give a fairly low number (70?). However, the burgeoning population of Māpua has not been factored into the traffic activity assessment provided by the applicant (CO7 appendix 6). The traffic assessment was done in December. This is not peak season, which is after christmas and into January and February. The use of the boat ramp by the wider region and boaties who mostly use Motueka and other launching sites has also not been factored into the traffic activity assessment provided by the applicant (CO7 appendix 6).

Another concern is the cost. According to the Boat Ramp Community Trust the estimated cost is $2.95 million (at the moment). Costs are said to be met partially from the Tasman District Council (ie the ratepayers) then ‘the community’ will fundraise for the rest. The use of ratepayers money to build a private club can be seen as profligate and a waste given other more pressing public projects could benefit instead. Money may better be spent on a project that would benefit the whole community including the boaties. For instance at a recent community association meeting a proposal was put forward to put in place a water monitoring system that would indicate levels of bacteria in the estuary. This is important as people swim (and fish) in the estuary and healthy estuary water is essential for the marine life of the area yet Mike Kinimoth counselor in favour of a boat ramp and building indicated that such a programme would be too expensive to run given other project cost overruns.

Unresolved safety issues. Council staff have raised serious concerns about inexperienced boaties using a boat ramp in this location in the Māpua channel.

Council staff have summarised comments from the council’s harbour master in a letter to the Boat Club Trust in August/23. In particular safety risks are highlighted. Māpua estuary tides and currents have particular safety implications for boating especially for inexperienced boaties. It is not clear how the Boat club intends to ensure the safety of inexperienced boaties and boaties who have come in from other areas… and the general public using the waterways for other types of recreation.

The boat club trust claims that the proposed ramp will “provide for an all-tide access and is sheltered by the wharf structure from the high tide flows (and winds)”. The harbourmaster replies: “Although this is the case during flood tides, during ebb (outgoing) tides the wharf structure will create a hazard to the users of the boat ramp as they may drift into it and as the tide pushes against the upstream side of the boat it is likely to flood and capsize. Also the wharf is used by swimmers during summer (signage does not stop the swimmers) and increased boating activity upstream of the wharf (during ebb outgoing tides) will create an increased safety risks between these conflicting user groups”.

The response by the proposal applicants to the council about these hazards is minimal. They suggest that Māpua Boat Club members will police the area. They may not be available, and they may not have the correct skills if something were to go wrong. They also point out that boats waiting to exit the channel can tie up at the wharf pontoon or get alongside the wharf. This will block other wharf users from wharf jumping and fishing.

Environmental impact
Since the rejection of a boat ramp in 2017 the magnitude of the project has grown substantially. The earthworks will require 1.7346 hectares of earthworks on land that has been previously been recognised by the council as too toxic to disturb. One article in stuff last year stated

“A cap of residential-quality soil covers the contaminated soil at the park. The material under the 0.5m cap is compacted commercial-grade pesticide residue, which is 200-600 times too contaminated to be allowed to leach into the estuary.” Stuff 02.03.2022

Appendix 12 of the application indicates that in order for amenities such as power etc to be provided for the building the soil cap will be breached and that erosion, sediment is critical.

In the detailed site inspection application (Appendix 7 of the application) Davis Ogilvy engineers refer the potential hazards caused by soil disturbance on this site and indicate that a robust management plan for contaminated soil will be needed before earthworks can commence. Workers will need safety equipment such as PPE gear, and respirators as there will be exposure to DDT, aldrin and dieldrin. The report also indicates that work will only be done when wind conditions permit and that contaminated soils will be stockpiled and covered by a tarpaulin. Is there a safety plan given the likelihood of a storm event? And what about dust etc infiltrating the wharf area, nearby houses and pedestrians?

Davis Ogilvie plans also include drainage to the wastewater main which runs through the pump station by the Apple shed and discharges into the estuary. The report highlights the need to fix an overloaded discharge pipe before water can safely be discharged into the estuary. Given the expectation of a growing Māpua population and the reasonably recent failures of the pump and pipe and the raw sewerage discharge into the estuary what guarantees do the people of Māpua have that these won’t impact on water activities such as swimming? How will we know if water quality is not being measured?

The Waimea inlet is already suffering environmentally as a result of increased motorboat and jetski ownership, particularly No Man’s Island. Building a state of the art new boat ramp on the huge scale proposed will result in many more motorized craft in the estuary and more disturbance of sensitive environmental areas. Potentially a new Māpua boat ramp may become the regional facility with users from a much wider catchment than just Māpua residents creating congestion on the roads and in the waterways. Activities such as wharf jumping and fishing, kayaking and paddle boarding will be jeopardised by the boat traffic. Currently there are no conditions on size or type of craft in the current application, or the number of users at any one time.

We have access to the channel on Rough island and on the Kina Peninsula. Many boats launch from Kaiteriteri and Marahau into the Abel Tasman national park. We do not need another very expensive council owned launch point along our coastline.

Conclusions
We acknowledge the boat club lost their ramp when the wharf precinct was commercialized and we sympathize . However the scale of the current proposal risks the loss of greenspace, congestion of roads and waterways and possible environmental impact. This proposal does not “promote the social, economic, environmental and cultural wellbeing of communities” as specified in the local government act. Instead it limits it.

We're working on our submission on the boat ramp. Today we came across this information in a letter from the TDC to The Boat Ramp Trust, (dated August 2023) " Objectively from a navigation safety perspective the Waterfront Park site
carries more safety issues (due to structure hazards, and conflicting user groups) than other nearby sites". This means there are potential safety hazards for swimmers, wharf jumpers, tide riders and other passive users of the Māpua wharf and channel. The boat Club claims that the site “provides for an all-tide access and is sheltered by the wharf structure from the high tide flows (and winds)”. The TDC's Harbourmaster questions this.... "Although this is the case during flood tides, during ebb (outgoing) tides the wharf structure will create a hazard to the users of the boat ramp as they may drift into it and as the tide pushes against the upstream side of the boat it is likely to flood and capsize. Also the wharf is used by swimmers during summer (signage does not stop swimmers) and increased boating activity upstream of the wharf (during ebb outgoing tides) will create an increased safety risks between these conflicting user groups". The Harbourmaster also asks this question: "How boats will be managed from drifting into/underneath the wharf in the
event of being caught out in tidal current or engine failure when
launching/retrieving. To read more, here is link to the TDC site. Scroll down to "first further request for information and response.

Māpua Community Boat Ramp Trust

There are just 3 days to go for feedback on the Māpua Masterplan. Feedback closes this Saturday, September 30th. This is our last chance to let TDC know what we think is important for the community and the future of Māpua. We encourage you to add your own pins, or just vote yes or no for the pins that others have added. It’s easy! And IMPORTANT!

Māpua Masterplan 2023 Join us in shaping the future of Māpua. Share your feedback by 30 September.

Māpua looks to the future - 'A desirable place to live' Feedback is being sought on a masterplan to cater to future growth in the coastal town of Māpua, west of Nelson.

Māpua Masterplan 2023 Join us in shaping the future of Māpua. Share your feedback by 30 September.

If you missed the drop in session for Community input for the Māpua Masterplan on September 2nd, there is another chance tomorrow, Thursday 14th. We urge everyone to take this opportunity to have your say while the Masterplan is being developed. The Masterplan in its current form plans to double Māpua’s population and build a business hub on wetland at at Seaton Valley that is only just above sea level in places.

Māpua Action Group is submitting feedback on the following issues:
-Infrastructure: No new houses until the stormwater problems are resolved.

-A design guide:
A design guide should be created with alternative housing designs that responds to the region’s environmental and social needs. There should be opportunities for mixed density owner-built homes and options for smaller affordable houses using sustainable building practices and design. With a good urban design and and some intensification on land within the current boundary of Māpua village, there would be enough land for a realistic number of new houses for Māpua without Greenfield development in Seaton Valley.

-Environment: Protecting the flora and fauna of our coastal and estuarine environments: The masterplan needs to prioritise the protection of Māpua’s sensitive ecosystems such as the Waimea Inlet, Seaton Valley Stream, the wetlands at Seaton Valley and the coast. These are very important areas for birds and many other native species. If the Masterplan goes ahead in its current form, Māpua’s human population would double. This means the numbers of domestic cats and dogs could also double which would seriously endanger the biodiversity of Māpua.

The drop in sessions are tomorrow, Thursday 14 September, 2.00 pm – 4.00 pm and 6.00 pm – 8.00 pm

Update. During our last storm event we posted some pictures of sewerage being pumped into the estuary. We asked the council to respond to a series of questions one of which was does the council require consent to discharge sewerage into the estuary. The Māpua District Community Association has also asked the council regulatory body about the pumping. So far the council have responded to the MDCA with meeting minutes including these statements from a report to the council Regulatory Committee 17th November.

3.7 The Council’s regulatory team is reviewing reports on the cause and consequence of unauthorised discharges occurring from the Council’s wastewater systems as a result of the August storm event. The reports that are required under the emergency provisions of the Resource Management Act have recently been received and are being worked through with our wastewater engineers. We will look at the circumstances, the nature of the information and responses both during and post event and consider the full range of regulatory requirements that are associated with otherwise unauthorised wastewater discharges.

3.8 Now that reports have been supplied, the two groups from the Council will meet to further refine agreed practices and procedures where weather events adversely impact on the Council’s wastewater systems. These discussions are important to ensure we meet legal obligations, including minimising and mitigating effects as well as providing appropriate reporting back to the community.

The storm event and the council responses support our notion that storm water and sewerage in Māpua are under pressure. More houses, more run off, more potential for floods, more potential for sewerage pump breakages, more pollution, silt etc. in the estuary, less bird life and swimmable water. We are heartened that the Council is continuiing to pause plan changes that will enable more houses in Māpua.

We've had a look at the results of the community survey about residential development in Māpua. https://shape.tasman.govt.nz/mapua-structure-plan.

Along with concerns about infrastructure, by and large the most of the 350 respondents indicated they wanted Māpua to retain a 'village' atmosphere and for there to be a variety of housing types concentrated in exisiting residentially zoned land.

The community workshops that were to happen in November have now been delayed until the end of the summer - no date yet.

A couple of months ago at a community meeting a TDC staff member suggested developing a design guide for Māpua. Support for this also came through clearly in the survey feedback. We will be writing to the council to find out if the design guide is underway yet and if a draft will be presented to the workshops at the end of the summer.

Māpua Structure Plan

From The latest The Atlantic (an American publication).

If you look at some of the fastest-growing areas in the country, a lot of those have really intense flood and hurricane risks. You saw it with Hurricane Harvey in 2017, which hit Houston and its rapidly expanding metro area. The areas that got the worst of that storm were those that had recently become sort of suburbanized; they were places that had recently put down lots of pavement to accommodate all these new neighborhoods, which were marked on FEMA maps as having high flood risk. I think there’s a bit of individual denialism of flood risk in these housing booms, too, but also people are guided to those locations by real-estate developers and given a false sense of security.

Lobby your councillors to stop rapid and overdevelopment in Māpua. Lobby your councillors to continue to Pause the Māpua Growth Plan. more information www.mapuaaction.nz

Mapua Action Group What is happening to Mapua? Find out about recent council planning changes and how we can influence council toward sustainable resilient communities.

If you want to know more about TDC candidates' views on the climate crisis and biodiversity, watch these sessions on Youtube. Very helpful.

TDC Meet the Candidates Questions on Climate Change and Biodiversity Share your videos with friends, family, and the world

Meet the councillors meeting tonight, Wednesday 21st Sept. at Māpua Hall. 7:00 pm. The Māpua Community Association have prepared questions. Food for thought. Have a look at NT2050 questions
(nelsontasman2050.org.nz) and councillor responses here.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/11ADizdcriJzrL54M-LxlvboxVqLXSZEp/view. Click on the link to find out what the councillors said.

220917_NT2050_Candidate responses_Rev 1.pdf

Community consultation is well underway with several constructive meetings last week. Council has extended the Mapua Structure Plan Survey until the 28th of September. At the bottom of the survey there is a space for feedback to the council. We encourage you to fill out the survey and add any issues that you feel are missing from the survey.
Last Wednesday 14th Sept. Council staff presented the scope of the Structure Plan to the Māpua Community Association.
The following issues were raised by the members of the Community Association:
Missing questions in the survey about rules for developers such as permeable surfaces, stormwater collection, solar power and domestic animal management.
Fears that development in Māpua could look like recent developments in Tasman District such as Richmond West. Council staff suggested a bespoke design guide for Māpua/Ruby Bay could be created that would aim to protect the coastal character of the village and maintain the landscape character of the surrounding landscapes of Māpua/Ruby Bay.
Concerns about the failings of the stormwater system and the vulnerability of the Waimea Inlet from stormwater entering the sewage system and causing overflow as happened in the recent rain event. At a recent MDCA meeting, Tonkin & Taylor/TDC introduced the Māpua Catchment Management Plan Project (CMP) which is just starting now and will be completed in 2023. A community member asked that no deferments be lifted until the CMP is completed. The system is at or beyond capacity already. However, council staff explained that current deferments can be lifted as soon as potable water and sewerage connection is available and that the capacity of the council owned stormwater system is not part of deferment agreements. This is an infrastructure issue that remains unresolved.
Confusion about potential numbers of houses if all deferments were lifted and further FDS rezoning through the Growth Plan occurred. Barry Johnson indicated that 1000+ houses could be built on deferred and rezoned land if everything goes ahead. He suggested that this could take thirty years, but there is no mechanism to restrain or slow down development once rezoning occurs and deferments are uplifted.
There is widespread discussion now that the projected population growth used in the FDS for Tasman has been overestimated. We believe that growth should be limited to what is necessary and appropriate for Māpua and that growth can be accommodated within the existing residential and deferred residential land.
We have to get our village design right…Now!
This first round of community consultation is nearly complete so don’t forget to complete the survey and have your say!
Public participation in these meetings and this survey is essential if Māpua is to retain its unique characteristics and protection of the environment. Council will collate the information they have gathered through the survey, meetings with community groups and iwi. The second round of community consultation will be in November after Council Planners present a first draft of the Māpua Structure Plan.

The TDC Community Survey for the Māpua Structure Plan is now available: https://environmentplan.tasman.govt.nz/mapua-structure-plan-2023
We think that there are quite a few issues that aren’t being addressed.

Some of the survey questions are difficult to answer due to the lack of parameters around projected dwelling and population numbers within the Māpua village boundaries and outlying area. The location and type of services, public amenities, density and type of housing, roading, parking etc. depend on knowing how many people will be living in the area and using Māpua village as a shopping and recreation hub. Households in the Rural 3 Zone, Mapua Estates and Mahana should be considered, particularly when calculating traffic movements and strain on services like the school and medical centre.

Māpua’s commercial and public services such as the school are very low lying and in a TDC Natural Hazard Zone, at risk of "coastal inundation and flooding”.( TRMP 13.1.3.7). Does the Council have plans to move these essential services and where would they be moved to? Climate patterns are changing rapidly. The rains we experienced a few weeks ago will happen again in the near future rather than the distant future.

Not all but much of the expected development depends on the Māpua Growth Plan Change that will go before the council early next year. The Council should continue to pause the Plan Change until wait until the Tasman Environment Assessment is completed. The Council should consider the social impact of rapid and large development in the area.

The council has responded to our questions about the pumping we saw happening during the rains in the past weeks. Read their response here:

-How often does this happen in rain events?

We have never pumped from this pump station into the estuary or had an overflow from this pump station before. Due to the scale of the rain event had we not pumped out this pump station then many of the manholes and pump stations through Mapua would have overflowed into the streets and very likely into private property as well.

-Has the frequency increased since the two latest subdivisions were built?

No, the risk has reduced due to the increased capacity of the wastewater network from recent upgrades.

-What is the network designed for and what is its current performance?

It is designed to service the areas zoned for residential and rural residential (serviced) development, which has not yet been fully developed. This rain event exceeded the system design in three pump station catchments. Over the four and a half day storm, 179mm of rain fell, twice the average rainfall for all of August for Māpua. We cannot construct a wastewater or stormwater network to cope with every rainfall event, it would be unaffordable.

-What type of rainfall events are expected to cause spill?

Wastewater networks aren’t designed for specific rain events. Industry standard is to design capacity for six times the average dry weather flow of a fully developed catchment. Most of the extra flow that overwhelmed parts of the network was the result of surface flooding. So any event that causes large areas of surface flooding will compromise the capacity of the network.

-What is the impact of future development on the spill frequency?

Provided development is restricted to the total number of properties used in the upgrade design and limited to areas zoned for development and surface flooding is limited, we should not have overflows.

-How will the spill frequency change under climate change?

Climate change is expected to result in higher intensity and more frequent rain events as well as larger tides and more frequent tidal inundation. Without interventions, for example raising infrastructure and floor levels, or managed retreat, overflows are likely to increase.

-Why were no warning signs erected and/or other notifications given to the community?

Warning signs were erected and there were frequent notices through the media and social media warning of contamination of water bodies and surface flow from floodwaters and wastewater overflows.

-Is there a resource consent for this discharge?

No, you cannot get a resource consent for untreated wastewater overflows in Tasman District but we do submit a report to the Council Compliance Team for every overflow that occurs in the district. This report details the impact, what actions were undertaken at the time and what will be done to reduce the risk of overflows in the future, within reason.