John Clark: Trust opposed to any park pipeline

Cornwall Park Cafe in Auckland. Photo / Jason Dorday

Opinion

When columnist Brian Rudman said in the New Zealand Herald recently that Watercare's Hunua pipeline across the city would cause disruption, he was right. This is to be expected for a major piece of city infrastructure.

But where he was quite wrong was to imply that the route chosen for the pipeline was the result of any sort of unilateral decision by the Cornwall Park Trust Board, or indeed against the long term interests of the city.

In fact while the Trust Board believes Watercare made the right decision, the route adopted for the pipeline was taken by Watercare following discussions with the Trust Board between 2009 and 2013. This was always Watercare's decision to make. Indeed had it wanted to Watercare was free to designate the route it wanted, and while the Trust could have opposed this, Watercare had considerable legislative powers to draw on in proceeding with whatever route it chose.

At the time the Trust Board had also assured Watercare that if Watercare wished to use such processes to compel a route through the park, the Board would cooperate in progressing the related legal processes to resolve the issue as quickly as reasonably possible.

Certainly the Trust argued against the proposed route because of its long-term damage to the park. Our concerns were shared by iwi. We also looked hard at finding routes through the park that would do less damage. Watercare offered financial compensation, although in the end the Board decided that the disruption to the park's long term future outweighed any financial return.

Some three years after this was first raised with the Trust Board, we were advised in December 2013 that Watercare had decided to investigate other route options drawing on its expertise in terms of costs and disruption. We were therefore disappointed to see Watercare recently publish a pamphlet implying the final route was the Trust Board's decision. This is incorrect.

As a charitable trust, the Trust Board exists to protect and develop the park as a gift given to New Zealand by Sir John Logan Campbell in 1901. Its success has been shown by the four million people who visit the park each year and awards it has received. Auckland Council has for some time contracted the Trust's expertise in running the adjoining One Tree Hill Domain.

Mr Rudman was right to say that once the pipeline had been laid the ground would be rehabilitated. But this would not have been the end of its impact. Along with disruptions for maintenance, the land above the pipeline would have been kept as a permanent access corridor, probably around 8 meters wide, making any future significant planting or landscaping impossible.

It would have inhibited plans and reduced options in enhancing the park which is already seriously constrained by the infrastructure of previous generations, including three large reservoirs, two pumping stations and six underground pipes. For example, we have recently opened a very popular new café in an area (pictured above) that would have been affected if the pipeline had gone ahead.

We do not like to see anyone put to inconvenience, but the pipeline could also have disrupted, and the permanent access corridor halted, the long term process of recovery of land at the eastern end of the park, which was taken as a hospital during World War Two and only returned for park use in the mid-1970s.

Mr Rudman cites Sir John's support for the first water reservoir at the park. But Auckland in 1902 and Auckland in 2015 are two very different places. In Sir John's time access to green space and open air would hardly have been an issue. It is a tribute to his vision that he could see how valuable the Park would become.

John Clark is chairman of the Cornwall Park Trust Board.