Disappointment as dispute keeps Gumdiggers Track closed

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JULIA WADE

One of Mangawhai’s estuarine tracks set to potentially ramble along waterfronts, over rural lands and through vineyard country, remains in limbo since being closed last year, with the view on the future path still unclear.

Gumdiggers Track, the 3.2 kilometre trail created by Mangawhai Recreational Charitable Trust (MRCT) and more than 50 volunteers between 2015 to 2018, winds around the inner estuary of Tara Creek on esplanade land, offering walkers and cyclists some relaxing time-out in nature, roaming under tall trees and along paths lined with native plants.

However, since neighbouring development Mangawhai Central Ltd (MCL) began construction early last year, the trail has been and remains closed to the public, bordered off by the developing company due to some sections, including the entrance, being laid on MCL’s land where excavation work was to commence.

Kaipara District Council (KDC) are continuing to assess whether the track requires upgrading to keep it in line with current standards, says KDC general manager for infrastructure, Jim Sephton, and to address the sections which were built on land now owned by MCL.

“The track was intended to be built within the three kilometres of the esplanade, however there are some locations where it has ended up travelling on to land owned by Mangawhai Central,” he says. “There is not yet a confirmed date for when it will re-open, we need to ensure the area is safe for the public so this will be done in consultation with Mangawhai Central who are continuing to work in the area.”

The esplanade is a strip of land along the estuary (the Queens Chain) and is vested to KDC as local authority under the Reserves Act 1977, ‘we are responsible for it’.

Discussions are also underway with regards to who will be responsible for maintenance of the track Sephton says, with arrangements being made with some community groups who have specific environmental and health and safety plans in place; ‘they will also be involved in the future so we can get the best result for the community’.

Costs to bring the track up to standard – future improvements and associated environmental and planning reports will possibly be paid for by the Track Upgrade Fund, and a ‘retrospective consent’, which initially KDC required from MRCT for some of the work previously undertaken on the track – will now ‘be picked up’ by council after the Trust withdrew their application.

“Council recognise the vision, energy, effort and determination of Trust members in creating such a valued community asset,” Sephton says.

“We are working closely with the Trust to continue to try and improve communications between all parties… and will continue to work with them to achieve this excellent vision.”

 

Mangawhai Recreational Charitable Trust
MRCT chair and initiator of the Gumdigger Track, Craig Jepson says the group have also been trying to work with KDC and recognise that MCL need to do what they have to for the track’s entrance to be reinstated. The three parties have held several meetings to work out the way forward for Gumdiggers, the latest in February this year. However, Jepson says he feels disappointed with the council and developing company’s approach and communication regarding the track which MRCT designed and created.

“Since Gumdiggers officially opened in 2018, we’ve received a huge amount of positive feedback from the community, it’s been very popular, and volunteers have put a lot of work and energy into it with clearance and planting, but now we’re denied access to even do maintenance,” he says. “They could let us in there on a weekend when the machines aren’t operating… the track is now fully overgrown in some places.”

Jepson agrees that some sections of the trail are not all aligned on ‘the community-owned esplanade’ and ‘encroach briefly as well as the loop’ onto Mangawhai Central’s land.

“However, we’re confident about what we’ve done because the former owners, Estuary Estate, gave us permission to build the track there and we followed an existing historical fence line and a previous track.”

He says KDC have also commissioned reports from consultants on the future of Mangawhai’s tracks, ‘but they never talked to us or the Trackies’.

“They spend all this money on advisors and reports, but the volunteers in Mangawhai who are trying to do good things in the community, have been shunned,” he says.

“Essentially I believe the council is treating the ratepayers pretty poorly when it won’t encourage or support the volunteers. Council should be fully engaged with the voluntary workers in this community.”

Regarding communication, the former concrete layer alleges there has been a number of miscommunications and assumptions made on the MRCT, including being accused of removing native vegetation and excavating the entrance of the track to create a car park, ‘I was only clearing weeds’, and been told the track ‘was poorly laid’.

“Also felt Mangawhai Central have been quite aggressive about wanting us to retrospectively consent the tracks for a short period, we said we would, then they wanted all the associated ecological reports which are actually already there… as we are only going to be possibly working on the esplanade from now on, we don’t need to do a retrospective consent, so we withdrew the application.”

The possible relocation of Gumdiggers also concerns Jepson and MRCT.

From evidence given in MCL’s Plan Change 78, a number of expert witnesses state that the track may be relocated further inland.

“There’s no need to move the track from its current location, its beautiful where it is, you can walk along under the pohutukawa and take in a view of the river,” he says.

“Council say there’s erosion, but I haven’t sighted any expert evidence to back it up. I’m a bit suspicious of their reasons to relocate.”

Since the February meeting, Jepson has emailed his enquires regarding the misconceptions and miscommunications to MCL and MDL Civil, the construction firm in charge of the development, as well as several council staff, but to date says he has not received a reply.

For the potential future of Gumdiggers, Jepson says MRCT have designed a trail leading off the esplanade and have been discussing with several landowners the possibility to take the track from Cove Road where the esplanade ends, and up as far as King Road to link with wineries and an art gallery, ‘a 20km round trip’.

“Walking and cycle tracks bring in huge financial benefits, from actually building the cycleways, to places people stop on the way,” Jepson says, who has just recently adventured the Timberlands Track with wife Jeanette and saw first-hand the economic gains.

“We also need more things to do down here… kids could also get on their bikes at Atkins Road and ride to school… it’ll be good for Mangawhai.”

 

Kaipara District Council reply
The Focus contacted KDC regarding several of the issues concerning MRCT. In response to whether volunteers could access Gumdiggers track during the weekend for maintenance, a council spokesperson replied that it would not be possible ‘as it continues to be a work site with hazards until MCL’s works in this area are complete’.

Refarding consultation with volunteers, the spokesperson says they have only recently engaged landscape architect company Isthmus, to start investigating only the Gumdiggers Track, but wants to assure that ‘as part of their work they will certainly be working with the Mangawhai Recreational Charitable Trust and volunteers who have local knowledge of the area’.

Council also confirm that there were comments made at the PC78 hearing ‘relating to whether the track could or would have to be located on MCL lands, due to the esplanade reserve being eroded to a point where the track cannot be wholly located within the esplanade. The Council is currently working to define the actual boundaries of the esplanade reserve and determine if the track can be located wholly within the esplanade reserve land’.

In a previous Focus article (Feb 22) MRCT trustee Mark Rowbotham commented on a number of the same issues regarding the closure of Gumdiggers, including whether ‘MCL and KDC have made a deal to move the boundary of the Esplanade Reserve as part of MCL’s reserve contribution obligations’.

When asked by the Focus if such a deal was likely, KDC stated, ‘there is currently no commitment made by the council on a way forward yet, nor any discussion with MCL on any potential reserve contribution until the boundaries of the existing esplanade reserve land are clarified’.

Mangawhai Central was also asked for comment by the Focus, and it appears there is some confusion regarding who actually closed the track on February 14, 2020.

As landowners, MCL are liable for the land on which the sections of Gumdiggers is built on, and spokesperson Brandon Morley says the company were not responsible for closing the track in February 2020, but understands that due to an abatement notice being served to MCRT, ‘around 18 months ago’, members are not actually allowed to continue their maintenance work until the issues of the notice are resolved.

“The future of Gumdigger’s is really between the council and Mangawhai Recreational Charitable Trust, we did attend a meeting earlier this year with both of the parties but we were more observers really, we’re just waiting for the situation to be resolved.”

Jepson says they were never served an abatement notice and asked council ‘about four times’ to see the forms.

Although initially an s92 was issued to MRCT ‘due to insufficient information for consent’, council now state that ‘no abatement notice was served or even drafted, the Council team preferred and requested to meet and work toward a solution involving a retrospective consent application and communicated this with the Trust via emails at the time’.

 

Created by dozens of volunteers between 2015 and 2018, the Gumdiggers Track is now overgrown in places and closed to the public. PHOTO/JULIA WADE

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“Volunteers have put a lot of work and energy into it with clearance and planting, but now we’re denied access to even do maintenance. They could let us in there on a weekend when the machines aren’t operating.”

- Craig Jepson