Central Hawke’s Bay river stopbank repairs progressing

Many communities are still doing it tough as they deal with how life has changed following Cyclone Gabrielle.

Hawke’s Bay Regional Council has nearly finished the repair of Central Hawke’s Bay stopbank breaches on the Tukituki and Waipawa Rivers, and as part of ongoing river management is removing gravel from rivers and streams across the district.

Regional council group manager asset management Chris Dolley says, “We are working closely with Central Hawke’s Bay District Council to repair stop bank breaches and scours in the district.”

Five teams and 30 people are working at Stockade Rd, Tapairu Rd, Walker Rd, Waipawa town scours and Stablefords.

Locally sourced material close to the breach and scour sites are being used, and this is then compacted and tested before being covered in a silt capping and topsoil, and then grass seeded, Dolley says.

Cyclone Gabrielle brought unprecedented flooding that caused about 5.6km of breaches in the 248km stopbank network across Hawke’s Bay. Further parts of the network were damaged by erosion.

Once repairs of the stopbank breaches are complete the team will work on scours and erosion sites.

Meanwhile, the regional council is managing significant gravel extraction from rivers and streams across the Central Hawke’s Bay district.

”There are 62 gravel extraction sites across the Upper Tukituki and Waipawa rivers with extraction also happening on the Makaretu, Tukipo and Mangaonuku streams,” says Dolley.

”This work will continue for the foreseeable future as part of our usual gravel extraction from the rivers in the district.

”We have had questions from members of the Waipawa community who are concerned about the level of gravel near the Waipawa township. We have resurveyed the Waipawa River and this showed that the gravel is at the right height above sea level.”