Part of this road beside a stream at the entrance to Baylys Beach was damaged as a result of flooding.
Photo / Supplied
Part of this road beside a stream at the entrance to Baylys Beach was damaged as a result of flooding.
Photo / Supplied
A former Kaipara mayor has lent his voice to calls for the local council to fix the stormwater system at a popular coastal settlement that was one of the worst-affected during the recent deluge.
Clean-up has started at the entrance to Baylys Beach on the west coast after torrential rain on Thursday afternoon
scoured out part of the accessway and flooded roads between the area and Dargaville.
Access to homes was available despite the deluge and Kaipara District Council contractors were assessing the damage yesterday morning.
Former Kaipara mayor Graeme Ramsey, who lives at Baylys Beach, said quite a bit of repair work was needed at the entrance to the beach that got washed out, together with a number of slips.
"The stormwater system here didn't cope and it's been an ongoing issue for the council, and there's been quite a lot of discussion over the last couple of years. Now the matter is urgent.
"The council has no choice but to address it urgently because stormwater flow affects a lot of developments out here. All the water has been directed into a stream that leads on to the beach where the road is.
"The stream is not coping with the water flow, the piping is not coping as well. We need a stormwater plan for the beach that can cope with the size of the community and the size of the weather events," Ramsey said.
He said more houses and driveways meant more water runoff that has not been catered for properly.
Photographer Robyn Preston said she has lived in the area for 18 years but has never seen water coming down through the entrance to the beach the way it did on Thursday.
"There are slips on the bank and vegetation has been washed off. Cars couldn't get out off the beach. Sometimes we've had king tides but they didn't do damage like this time round."
A car gets stranded on Baylys Beach after a deluge dumped more than 70mm of rain in the area.
Photo / Robyn Preston
Her rain gauge measured 78mm at the peak of Thursday's rain.
A Kaipara District Council spokesman said council contractors were looking into the damage at the beach entrance that was most greatly affected throughout the district.
He said it was too early to give an estimate of the damage to council infrastructure.
Meanwhile, Far North District Council staff were due to inspect homes affected by a slip at Te Ngaere Bay, 40km north of Kerikeri, at the peak of Thursday's downpour.
The slip, estimated at 50-60m high, sent tonnes of mud and pine logs crashing into a house moments after a young family fled to safety.
Another house at the top of the slip was not damaged but would also be inspected to ensure it was safe.
The results of the inspection, including whether the bottom house was inhabitable, were not known at edition time yesterday.
