46 | Tasman District Council T T Virginia Wright Getting Tasman back on its feet The work involves stopbanks, rock-erosion protection, and rivers that have changed direction; and roads that have slipped and subsided that needed to be re-opened. INFRASTRUCTURE It’s been a challenging year for the Tasman District with two severe weather events, one after the other, in June and July with devastation to rivers and roads that is estimated will cost up to $45million to repair, and that’s just the infrastructure. The toll on locals is incalculable, and as the clean-up continues there’s no easy solution for people’s homes and livelihoods as group manager community infrastructure for Tasman District Council and recovery manager for the Nelson Tasman Emergency Recovery Group, Richard Kirby, is well aware. Over his years of working for various district councils, he’s been through other emergency events and has been impressed time and again by the strength of the community as they come together to help each other, working alongside council and government for the benefit of all for as long as it takes. It’s that community spirit that has drawn Richard to put his skills to good use working with local councils for over 40 years as they help and support people to get real outcomes that make a difference to their lives. He’s a Fellow of Engineers New Zealand and has been with the Tasman District Council for the last eight years. His ongoing focus on combining infrastructure strategy and advice with community welfare is vital when it comes to the aftermath of severe weather events. They are facing a bill of around $20 million to repair the council infrastructure on the Motueka and Wai iti rivers, and another $20m to $25m for roading repairs throughout the district, with final assessments ongoing. The work involves stopbanks, rock-erosion protection, and rivers that have changed direction; roads that have slipped and subsided that needed to be re-opened – the last one due to be reinstated by the end of November giving tourists access to the Kahurangi National Park and allowing locals to drive home without needing a vehicle on either side of the slip; and the Tasman Great Taste Cycle Trail, a 60km loop through Nelson, Wakefield, Richmond Motueka and Kaiteriteri that’s a key tourist attraction in the Tasman Region, which they want to repair and reinstate as soon as possible, with work well underway. With recent closures of the local timber mill and the Sealord factory, the local economy has been further hit. Tourism is increasingly important for the district, but equally important are the people struggling to get their livelihoods back on track. For those farmers, horticulturalists and orchardists, whose land was buried under silt and gravel twice over, clearing the land comes first. “We talked to a farmer on the road out of Riwaka to Kaiteriteri and established a dumping zone,” says Richard. “There’s about 13,000 cubic metres of silt and gravel that has to come off the farms, and his land is low-lying so layering that silt and gravel properly and grassing it all up at the end will give him a new paddock that is slightly elevated and less likely to flood, and it gives us somewhere to put it all.” The government-funded Enhanced Task Force Green has trained teams of unemployed people to help with lifting fences and clearing those cubic metres of silt and gravel among other thing. Task Force Kiwi volunteers also fly in at weekends to put their skills with heavy maStronger communities, present and future LEARN MORE
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