ARC turns down sand mining application off Pakiri Beach

The sight of tugs and sand mining barges near the shore at Pakiri and Mangawhai beaches will be a thing of the past if the Auckland Regional Council has its way.

ARC environment committee members yesterday recommended that the Minister of Conservation refuse resource consents for continued "near shore" sand extraction by McCallum Bros and Sea Tow.

The companies sought to renew consents which lapsed in February.

They wanted to take a combined 76,000 cubic metres of sand yearly for 20 years from the near shore, an area a few hundred metres offshore in waters 4m to 8m deep.

But committee chair Dianne Glenn said evidence showing the need to preserve and protect the environment won out over the companies' views about the importance of the sand to the region's big construction projects.

Mrs Glenn said commissioners accepted it was likely that sand extraction was contributing to coastal erosion within the Mangawhai-Pakiri embayment of sand deposits.

It would adversely affect the habitat of two threatened bird species, the New Zealand fairy tern and the New Zealand dotterel.

The companies are likely to appeal against the ARC decision.

The Minister of Conservation last year refused to allow extra sand to be taken from the coastal marine area of Mangawhai Harbour.

Nick Williams, spokesman for Friends of Pakiri Beach, said the ARC decision was in line with the minister's Mangawhai decision.

He said it was clear that as no new sand was coming into the embayment, continued extraction was not sustainable.

Auckland University opposed the application, science dean Professor Richard Bellamy saying the university feared further loss of sand would change the nature of Goat Island Bay - home of the popular marine reserve and the university's Leigh Marine Laboratory.