Welcome to the Midnight Collective Broadsheet 21
Actively supporting NZ’s endangered wetland birds
 |
| BLack water lake forming at the Poplar Rd site |
In a previous post in early February we
indicated that the NZTA (the New Zealand Transport Authority) was having trouble
with their preferred option of digging out the Wharemauku Swamp and laying the
Kapiti Expressway upon what they thought would be solid ground underneath. They had put this option to the Board
of Inquiry while admitting it was theoretical, because they didn’t know what was
going on underground. There was concern about this strategy because it would
mean putting a dam through the centre of this region without any understanding
of where the water was flowing underground.
 |
| Logs used to settle swamp and drag off water-Poplar Rd |
If water was flowing
towards the coast underground, which seemed likely given that swamp water flowed into the Wharemauku
every time it rained, it meant that it would dry out the coastal side and dam up the other, the consequences of which could have been very serious for our most important wetlands, including the last remaining remnant of swamp forest at Nga Manu Nature Reserve The Board for
reasons best known to itself, showed little interest in the matter, trusting to
the hem and the haw put in front of it by the NZTA.
 |
| Black water lake on the south side of Poplar Rd |
Three weeks ago the NZTA
finally admitted to abandoning this option because what they have encountered
isn’t watery peat but peaty water. They can’t dig it out. Now with winter
setting in you can see the problems they are encountering. They have tried to put a drain down one side of the expressway, on the approach to Poplar Rd but succeeded
simply in creating a large blackwater lake. This area forms a lake through winter anyway (which presumably the NZTA know) so the situation is only going to get worse.
Option B is now being
actioned which involves laying 1.5 million tonnes of rock fill on top of this
very liquid core. Around 20 years or so ago, the north-western motorway in
Auckland took this option through
the mangrove swamps on the Waitamata. It now lies underwater at full tide and is undergoing a long, inconvenient and very costly repair.
The most troubling issue
however has been the role of the news media, which has been acting as a cheer
leader for the NZTA. It has carried no independent critical analysis of why the
NZTA has changed its minds direction, or carried out any investigation into how these decisions were made and their financial implications. What they are carrying are rehashed stories churned out by the NZTA’s media managers.
So remember, when all of
this turns to custard –you heard it hear first. And here finally is a sobering photograph
that illustrates just how tricky it is trying to do construction work in a 1000 year old swamp.
These are the piles of a new building, currently being erected near Coastlands.
This is about a kilometre from where the expressway will be carving up the dune lake. Our estimate is that these piles were set 30 feet plus into the ground.
Yet this is close to the railway and the hillside in relatively benign terrain.
 |
| Piles waiting to be driven for new building at Coastlands |
Track we were listening to while posting this Elvis
Don't stop thinking of me,
don't make me feel this way
No comments:
Post a Comment