Plan to scrap Milford Sound airstrip meets with strong opposition

Wednesday, 28 July 2021

A move to scrap the Milford airstrip has been met with opposition from some Queenstown-based tourist businesses.

Plans to scrap the Milford airstrip have been meet with strong opposition from some tourist groups who say it will impact significantly on their businesses.

The Milford Opportunities master plan was launched in Te Anau on Wednesday and part of the plan includes looking at removing the airstrip, banning fixed-wing aircraft in favour of helicopters and blocking cruise liners from entering the sound.

They are ideas in the plan to help manage tourist numbers to the taonga (treasure) and create a more sustainable and environmentally-friendly visitor experience.

Project governance group chairman Dr Keith Turner acknowledged some aspects were likely to receive the most pushback.

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Visitor numbers peaked in 2019 with 870,000 visitors through Milford Sound, up from 430,000 in 2013 – which most agreed were simply unsustainable.

“While Covid set back the numbers, we expect them to return because it is a rare opportunity to visit true wilderness,” Turner said.

He stressed that the masterplan was a concept subject to detailed designs, business cases, and government approval, and that it would likely be four to five years before any of the ideas were realised.

Complex conversations and negotiations with commercial operators lay ahead as the project moved into its implementation phase, he said.

The group has proposed cruise ships not be allowed into the inner sound in a bid to make Milford Sound carbon zero.

The decision to remove the airstrip was based on four factors, Turner said: the instability of the land under it, the cost of maintaining it, the fact that it took up a third of the flat land in Milford Sound, and that it blocked some of the best views of Mitre Peak.

Queenstown Milford Users Group chairman James Stokes said he disagreed with this rationale.

Scenic flights were tied to the history of Milford Sound, with the first flight to the area in 1932 and the airstrip built in the 1950s, he said.

Project governance group chairman Dr Keith Turner addresses a large turnout in Te Anau. Left is Southland district mayor Gary Tong.

The highest-rated tourism activities in Queenstown were flights to Milford Sound which were booked by the high-end visitors that Tourism Minister Stuart Nash had indicated New Zealand should be attracting, Stokes said.

Public consultation on the project showed few respondents wanted the airfield closed, he said, questioning the logic of banning flights when the project aimed to reduce road congestion.

The aviation group would be meeting with the Milford Opportunities group in Queenstown on Thursday, where it would reiterate its opposition to the recommendation, Stokes said.

A portion of the large attendance at the Milford Governance Group meeting at Te Anau on Wednesday.

Queenstown mayor Jim Boult generally supported the plan, but said he had been against removing the airstrip “from the get-go.”

“It’s a short-term view to close the airport,” he said, adding there was conflict around concerns over the stability of the land when the masterplan also proposed building new facilities in Milford Sound.

Real Journeys general manager Paul Norris expressed concern for his aviation colleagues, but said as a Te Anau resident, he was pleased with the focus placed on the Fiordland basin and greater Southland region.

The willingness of businesses to invest in the plan would depend on the details worked out in the next few years, he said.

Other notable proposals include creating nodes along the Milford Road corridor to spread visitor attractions, and thereby spread traffic throughout the day, using electric and hydrogen vehicles to create a zero-carbon tourist attraction, and creating a new governance body to work through the overlapping legislation for the area.

A visitor centre and transport exchange have been proposed for Te Anau, to create a gateway to Milford Sound, while a permit system will be in place to manage entry past Eglinton Valley – although Kiwis won’t have to pay.

Work on the series of recommendations for the future of Milford Sound began in 2017 and more than 1600 pages of reports and analysis were produced in the process of creating the final masterplan document.

Ōraka Aparima Rūnaka kaumātua Muriel Johnstone called the project the answer iwi had been asking for.

She was looking forward to restoring the wairua (essence) of the culturally and historically significant space.

Ngāi Tahu kaumātua Michael Skerrett said iwi had been involved with all aspects of the project to ensure there was true participation, rather than it being a “box ticking excercise”.

An investment of $15 million from the Tourism Communities: Support, Recovery and Re-set Plan will fund the next stage of the project.