Auckland builds new beaches

Thursday, 22 January 2015

Auckland's beaches might look natural but 20 popular spots have ongoing maintenance or in the case of a major new project in Onehunga project, are completely manmade.

Nine entirely new beaches are being created as part of the Onehunga Foreshore Restoration Project, which is thought to be the world's largest foreshore reclamation project for recreational purposes.

When finished, a 6.8 hectare seaside park on reclaimed land will feature nine beaches.

Three of the beaches will be sandy for swimming, requiring about 11,000 cubic metres of sand to be trucked in from Ports of Auckland.

The new coastline will stretch more than 1 kilometre. The project is costing $28 million - $18m from NZTA and $10m from the council's Maungakiekie-Tamaki Local Board.

The foreshore, which is Auckland Council's parks department's largest capital project, will open in time for next summer.

Auckland Council parks manager Jane Aickin said the Onehunga project might be the biggest beach development, but numerous other beaches across Auckland were 'nourished' with sand brought in from other places or redistributed along the beach.

Auckland had more than 1600km of coastline and some of them needed intense management to provide coastal protection and make the beaches look better, Aickin said.

Auckland's popular Mission Bay, Kohimarama and St Heliers beaches had sand brought in and periodically redistributed.

Groynes or rocky outcrops were also built to keep the sand from drifting, to widen the recreational area and protect the ageing seawall.

Aickin said 30,000 cubic metres of sand was brought in for Mission Bay alone to recreate the beach in 1996 at a cost of $2.2m.

The sand came from offshore near Pakiri, north of Auckland and was pumped onto the beach from a barge stationed in the harbour.

No more sand was needed after the initial load was brought in, but it was periodically redistributed.

Work on the three beaches was consented in 1990 and completed in 2008.

The council also carried out extensive work on Orewa Beach in the north.

The old rock seawall was falling apart so it was removed and the sandy, dune environment was enhanced by moving the sand that accumulated when the groyne was installed and the estuary channel diverted.

Aickin said people were starting to see the benefits of using 'soft engineering' solutions rather than building hard structures everywhere.

Pt Chevalier Beach, small beaches in Herne Bay and Blockhouse Bay, and beaches on the shore of Manukau Harbour have also been replenished.

Auckland Council Onehunga Restoration Project manager Greg Hannah said the genesis of the project went back to 1974 when the South-Western Motorway 'cut the community off from the foreshore'.

In the 1990s the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) agreed to fund the majority of the project, after lobbying from the local community, Hannah said.

There were 1000 positive submissions when the plan went out for consultation and the public were getting 'pretty excited' now they could see the beaches taking shape.

During the past two years 85,000 man hours had gone into constructing the new foreshore.

The fill for the construction site came from the Waterview Connection tunnelling project.

As well as the three swimming beaches the Onehunga shoreline will have heavily-planted rocky beaches, which will provide a habitat for birds.

New Zealand's endangered dotterels had already made a comeback, Hannah said.

While the birds' early arrival had caused a few construction issues, it was great to be achieving ecological goals, he said.

Work had to be done in conjunction with the stormwater department to get the water quality up to swimming standard.

Auckland is not the only region where the beaches get a bit of TLC.

In 2003, 22,000 tonnes of sand was brought to Wellington's popular Oriental Bay from Golden Bay in Nelson.

The nourishment was part of Wellington City Council's plan to enlarge and enhance Freyberg and Oriental Bay beaches.

There was even brief talk of constructing an artificial beach in Christchurch's Cathedral Square.