Working with the environment
During the District Plan meeting on the 17th of March I was able to work with Deputy Mayor Foon on an a motion to start work on incorporating our natural streams and catchments into our next Spatial Plan.
With our rapidly changing environment we’re seeing flooding becoming more frequent. Tāmaki-makaurau has a new Sponge City plan, but Pōneke doesn’t quite have one as specific yet. While we have some rules that are city wide in our District Plan, we don’t have as much planning at a stream or catchment level.
“Even if global carbon emissions drop significantly in the coming years, the science indicates we will experience more frequent and more intense rain events for the foreseeable future.”
The next steps for updating ‘Our City Tomorrow – He Mahere Mokowā A Spatial Plan for Wellington City’ will provide a coordinated programme focussing particularly on catchment and area scale stormwater management solutions.
As part of this work we’ll be able to look at the way that our city responds to weather events through daylighting streams, building wetlands, increasing the number of green spaces and trees in the inner city, and managing the flow of stormwater off of private property.
Wellington Water / Stuff
“Natural ways of absorbing urban water are about fifty per cent more economical than human-made solutions, and are 28 percent more effective”
He Mahere Mokowā is the perfect place to take another look at how we manage water in Pōneke. We can uphold te mana o te wai, be guided by mātauranga māori, and reduce the risks of flooding while increasing the biodiversity and health of our streams.
Work on this will start shortly after our Te Ao Māori plan change.
