Water discovery centre opens
$10.5m Waiaroha facility to educate, raise awareness
Hastings’ new Waiaroha drinking water treatment storage facility and discovery centre has officially opened. The centre is a Hastings District Council commitment to making safe drinking water its top priority after the 2016 Havelock North water and health crisis in which four people died. It is the last major element of Hastings District Council’s Drinking Water Strategy to be completed.
The total drinking water strategy has cost $95 million. The strategy received $15m from the Government’s Three Waters Package and $80m from Hastings District Council.
The Waiaroha facility, which opened last Friday, has $10.5m of that money dedicated to it.
Mayor Sandra Hazlehurst said the primary purpose of the improved water facility is to ensure Hastings’ drinking water is safe, and to help people to understand the water cycle.
The facility’s goal is to raise community awareness and provide schools with an indoor and outdoor space for water education.
Director of major capital projects for Hastings District Council, Graeme Hansen, said it’s exciting they are able to deliver the latest technology in terms of treatment and management of water, and to also have a space onsite to educate the public.
The discovery centre offers a unique experience to gain an understanding
of the water journey from the aquifer, and to learn through touch and sound.
Hansen said it was a helpful and playful way for people to learn where water comes from and where it goes.
“The activity in the middle of the project is a series of pumps and clouds and it’s intended probably as much for adults as it is for kids. It’s a competition to fill your cloud the quickest and then it actually rains down,” he said.
The site on the corner of Southampton and Hastings Sts near the CBD is also home to a 10-millionlitre water storage and treatment plant. The education centre will deal with a range of water-related challenges and encourage tamariki to consider a better future for water conservation and care.
“If this is a catalyst for the next
generation to consider other ways of doing it better, or in different ways, or this is the reason for them to get engaged, then that will be the success of the project,” Hansen said.
He hopes the centre will encourage people to understand the importance of conserving water for what he sees as a particularly challenging future ahead.
The discovery centre, both indoor and outdoor, is open for the public to explore. The intention is for people to experience the whole site. Hansen said. “The intent of this project is that the facilities are all free. The external facilities and outside education part is freely available all day, any day, whereas the Heretaunga discovery centre is dedicated to a six-day week and with a focus around schools and education, so it will evolve in terms of the curriculum.”