Russel Norman, ever alert, has seen through the National Party's devious machinations around the Horokiri Stream, which they need to have 'de-moated' in order to further their plans to build Transmission Gully.
"OK, how bad can it get. Currently Horokiri, Ration and Pauatahanui Streams near Porirua are strongly protected under the Wellington Regional Freshwater Plan. And for good reason – they are the home of a lot of endangered New Zealand fish.
But these streams and their gullies are also the proposed route for Transmission Gully motorway from Porirua to Kapiti.
So you guessed it. The Nats are moving to de-protect these stream so they can build the motorway on them."
This is a development that our very own Environment Southland councillors ought to be made aware of.
I'll do my best.
Sunday, February 13, 2011
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With the development of the Southern Motorway to SH20 extension in Auckland, they diverted the Puhinui stream to a new location some 200 metres away from the new roading system.
Part of the relocation was the moving of All fish and wildlife from the old streambed into the new one.
The move was part of the whole Puhinui Stream eco system protection plan
http://www.manukau.govt.nz/tec/catchment/puhinui_pages/pdf/puhinui_stream_rest_web.pdf
It is hoped that this type of rerstortion project will continue now that the Manukau City Council has been absorbed into the Supercity but it does outline what is possible if there is will power by the local authorities.
I spent months debating whether to 'create' a stream with a bed of imported rock on my own property - luckily further digging revealed the original bed but...it became apparent that a recreation was a very poor second to the original. The new Puhinui stream may be a good thing Gerrit, I can't tell from your post (haven't followed your link yet but I will). I'd not like to think that 'make a new one' would be the way streams that have the poor fortune to be in the way of developments might be managed from here on in. As too moving all of the wildlife - how far did they go with that? Invertabrates as well? Seems odd.
With 6 billion people on the planit, there are always going to be projects that change the watercourses and landscapes.
Short of a major cull of people, nothing will prevent it.
Be it large like the three gorges dam project in China or small like moving the Puhinui Stream 500 metres are so to a new location.
Can every single creature and plant be transferred? No.
Can we do our best to relocate and restart the ecology in that stream? Yes.
Same with the streams in the path of the Transmission Gully road way.
One can take the stance that the road development should not take place simply to preserve the existing streams OR one could put in place a remedial relocating programme that enables the streams to continue to be a fully mature eco system.
So any and every natural feature is up for 're-locating' Gerrit?
There must be limits, both to what the environment can sustain, and on what we do to the environment for our own sakes. When the last stream is being 'shifted', we might pause, reflect and cringe at our foolishness.
I can understand where you're coming from Robert, but how often have you drien into Wellington from up the Kapiti Coast in the last few years? Successive governments put Transmission Gully into the Too Hard basket for years, during which the cost has risen exponentially. The coastal route through Pukerua Bay, Paremata and Plimmeton cannot realistically be expanded, and rail services already run at capacity at peak times.
Transmission Gully has to go ahead, and the sooner the better. I am sure that environmental concerns will be an important consideration, but they cannot be the only consideration.
Why not relocate a stream?
They naturally relocate depending upon rainfall/flooding, natural obstructions (fallen trees,silting) etc.
What is the difference between nature relocating a stream or mankind?
Biggest natural relocation I've seen is the Waikato River mouth where a new channel formed south of the existing one.
Was not that long ago the Waikato actually flowed out to sea at Thames. Nature relocated the river to flow into the Tasman and not the Hauraki Gulf.
*back soo. Off to meet a VIP.
Why can't we move it? Because there is far more diversity and scale to nature than we are capable of ever comprehending. We can tell ourselves we're moving it, but we are moving only what we know - the fish, rocks and water. Proposing to move a stream, whilst maintaing it's "original form", is the most idiotic thing I have ever heard. Similarly stupid would be to 'move' the great barrier reef, the tundra of siberia, or the old growth forests of tasmania.
Nick,
People and Nature have been moving streams, hills, forests, beaches, oceanic waterways, lakes, mountains, in fact the whole landscape for millions of years.
Nothing but nothing will prevent an eco system for growing or disappearing by human or natural means.
So would it not be best to move a stream and preserve its eco system as best we can?
Hopefully you are not a gardener for digging up the soil entails altering the ecosystem of worms, bugs, natural elements, etc.
Add compost and you change that ecosystem even further.
Robert complains about the birds eating his fruit on the trees.
Is netting and scaring birds away not upsetting the ecosystem? What will the bird poulation eat and where will they nest?
Every ecosystem is in flux and change, be it a stream relocated to make for a road required in the future (to enable Wellington people an access North if (when?) global warming increases high tide levels), or the Waikato River forming a new delta at the river mouth and upsetting the whitebait.
Change happens continuously. Get used to change.
I'm entirely aligned with Nick's view.
Engineering a stream is foolishness and arrogance, in my view. Nick's explanation around the subtlety of the interrelationships etc. of a natural system and the rough approximations we attempt is correct.
Gerrit I suspect, is joking, unless he is describing something we are not able to envisage. As to the perils of excluding birds from fruit trees, it hardly equates with 'creating' a stream from scratch. I can't see how anyone could make a good job of that. Gerrit describes how nature 'does' this, but misses the point that such changes are usually very destructive or very, very gradual. The proposal to make a new stream in the scenario Gerrit describes seems loopy as.
Invent - my issue is not around Transmission Gully - that's a folly I'll leave to Wellingtonians and the mad fool Dunne. I'm talking geo-engineering and the rough science it pretends to be.
Robert,
Align yourself anyway you like, but you cannot get away from the reality that everything you use, has or is effecting natural eco systems.
The plot of land you house sits on has been altered to enable foundations to be set, the road you ride your bike on has been aligned to suit the requirement off grade and slope to suit horse, bike, car and truck. Streams and watercourses are piped and shifted to prevent erosion under the road.
The alloy boat you went on the water in recently was made from mined bauxite that required digging up and relocating an eco system, the electricity generation to create the aluminium a river was relocated (Manapouri).
The electricity generated that enables you to read this possibly comes from the Clyde Dam. Another eco system relocated and altered.
By planting fruit tress you must first have had a cleared section of native bush. Another eco system relocated and altered.
The new eco system you have created by planting trees fills with life that feeds on the new eco system but you want to prevent that (so perversely creating another eco system that does not include the birds).
Everything we do (even dying requires burial or CO2 producing creamation emmisions)alteres an eco system.
So fault the relocating of streams as done by the Puhinui Stream project all you want, but dont be a hypocrite and say it is wrong to do, if you yourself are continously utilising the benefits gained by the altered and relocated eco systems.
Gerrit - I understand completely that my presence here results in numerous changes to the environment but there is a profound difference between planting a fruit tree on what once was farmland, and destroying a complex natural system like a stream. In establishing my orchards here, I haven't destroyed anything other than a simple broom/cocksfoot bi-culture. In it's place, I've developed a complex biologically rich ecosystem.
The relocation of a stream will do the opposite.
You could just as easily argue that I shouldn't oppose the destruction of a wetland for the sake of another dairy farm, because I plant potatoes. Yours, with all due respect, seems a nonsense argument.
Not nonsense at all.
You detroyed one eco system (though it may have been a poor performing one) with another, that in your view is much more worthy of the use of the land resource availalbe.
I guess if, in the eyes of the recipient, the change to the eco system is "better" then it is permissible to change the eco system.
So if building a road is a better use of the land resource currently utilsed be a stream, by your logic it is totally supported to do just that.
You conveniently forget to address that everything you utilise has come about through the destruction, relocation or alteration of an eco system.
We are talking past each other - a polite way of saying you miss the point.
That it is impossible for us to relocate ecosystems and maintain their original form - is it an or, not an and - regardless of what anyone anywhere thinks is "better".
I use 'degree of biodiversity' as a rough guide to development of ay sort.
I think it's the best measure of human endeavour on the land.
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