River plan causing waves
City’s leaders at odds over millions of dollars to be spent on riverside transformation. Aaron Leaman reports.
Turning Hamilton around to embrace the Waikato River will cost city ratepayers upwards of $4.75 million over the next decade.
The Hamilton City River Plan was adopted by the city council last year and aims to transform the city’s relationship with the river through a mix of shortterm and long-term projects.
Funding costs for the plan have been pencilled into the council’s draft 10-year plan and for the first time show the financial burden ratepayers will have to bear to bring the river plan vision to life.
Council staff have proposed $250,000 be spent in 2015/16 and $500,000 in each subsequent year.
Mayor Julie Hardaker, who has been a driving force behind the river plan, said the funding package would allow ‘‘critical work’’ to start along the city’s 16 kilometre river corridor.
River projects expected to start during the next two years include the Pukete flower bridge, the Wellington St Beach river swimming pool and the development of a master plan for Ferrybank and Roose Commerce Park.
The river plan aims to turn Ferrybank into the city’s premier river destination with a mixture of cafes, restaurants and office and retail space.
‘‘Funding will enable projects to get under way, the low-hanging fruit, and the public have certainly said they’re interested to see it actually starting and this is a good opportunity for us to enable that to happen,’’ Hardaker said.
Additional funding will be required for specific projects and Hardaker said detailed planning and design work would provide councillors with more clarity.
But elected members remain divided over the river plan’s merits, with councillors Dave Macpherson, Karina Green, Garry Mallett and Andrew King voting against the funding package.
Macpherson said the river plan envisaged projects that were ‘‘beautiful, lovely, good-to-use’’ but was made possible because of council cost-cutting in other areas such as community and social support.
‘‘It [river plan] leaves me cold. I don’t want to be a wet blanket in terms of river development, I support the concept there, but not at any cost. I wonder if the Business Classifieds Crosswords reason we can afford or think we can afford to spend in this area is because we’ve cut spending in a number of other areas, some of which I don’t agree with.’’
King said the river plan was a ‘‘pet project’’ and predicted its costs to escalate.
Hamilton’s founders were right to build the city up high, away from the river, and knew the dangers of seasonal flooding along the river corridor.
‘‘Once Lake Taupo gets up to a certain height they have no choice, they will let the water go, we will get another wet season and they will have to let that water go and the Ferrybank will flood again,’’ King said.
Mallett said the river plan was a magnificent project but was pitched at the wrong time and was being carried out by the wrong people. Instead, council should step aside and let the private sector fund river developments.
In reply, councillor Ewan Wilson said the river plan had to be embraced although acknowledged it came with risks. Some people will criticise the council for spending money on the river but city leaders had to balance ‘‘the needs of the now with the projected needs of the future’’, Wilson said.
‘‘I think in generations to come people will look back and say ‘finally some council had the courage, the conviction to start implementing and start turning the city to embrace the river’.’’
Councillor Angela O’Leary said councils across New Zealand and around the world were spending upwards of $20m on seed funding to develop their waterfronts.
The council’s funding proposal of $4.75m over the next decade was ‘‘insignificant’’ by comparison but reflected residents’ overwhelming support for the river plan.
‘‘Councillors who are thinking of voting against this, it is my opinion that you are very, very out of touch with the residents that live in the city,’’ O’Leary said.
The draft Long-Term Plan’s consultation document will go to councillors for signoff on March 25.
Public consultation on the draft plan starts on April 1. Family notices Opinion News Racing Sport Entertainment Television Weather World