Rakino moorings anger boaties

Boaties and landowners are at loggerheads over plans to introduce private moorings at Rakino Island in the Hauraki Gulf.

The Auckland City Council yesterday reduced the number of planned moorings from 80 to 48, at the start of a two-day application for a private plan change before the Auckland Regional Council.

But recreational boat owners argue that the proposal still cuts off their access to the island.

Rakino Island, a 90-minute sail from Auckland, is a popular mooring spot in the inner gulf. It has 76 private landowners, few of whom live there.

When the council began a private plan change last year to provide landowners' moorings, it ignited a battle about the rights of private landowners versus the ordinary boatie.

The plan change attracted 670 submissions, 633 opposed to it.

Auckland City councillor Doug Armstrong, who has owned a property on the island for 30 years, made a submission yesterday saying most of the time the bays were deserted and, for the few peak "loading" days in summer, boaties and moorings peacefully co-existed.

Gerald Lanning, a lawyer for the council, acknowledged that the original plan to extend the 20 private moorings at Sandy Bay to 30 and create another 30 moorings at Woody Bay and 20 at Home Bay, would have had "significant impacts" on recreational boaties.

The new plan was for 30 moorings at Sandy Bay, 15 at Woody Bay and three at Home Bay.

He said the new plan would satisfy the needs of landowners who had a limited ferry service and the recreational boaties who visited the island.

"The point is that, for recreational boaties, Rakino Island is not the only available destination. On the other hand, those that need to access their land on Rakino have no or a very limited choice as to how to access the island and locations to moor their boats," Mr Lanning said.

Kevin O'Sullivan, a member of the Waipuna and Panmure boating clubs, said outside the hearing that the City of Sails was based on the principle of casual anchorage access to bays.

"Woody Bay has probably been the par excellence place in the inner gulf for over 100 years and the proposal here is to give it to some people who are landowners."

Boaties were already excluded from Matiatia, Owhanake Bay and Rocky Bay on Waiheke Island, School House and Harris bays at Kawau Island and "very soon there will be nowhere to go to", he said.

Boatie Brian O'Neill said the existing moorings were unlawful.

"Why is the council going in to bat for some of their citizens who, by their own admission, are engaged in an unlawful activity - it's endorsing the burglar."