BIG PLANS: A concept design showing what the new Mount Maunganui information centre could look like. IMAGES/JASMAX
An iconic, culturally significant information centre costing up to $5 million has been proposed for cruise ship passengers disembarking at the Port of Tauranga.
The new council was looking at a range of concepts that included the original preferred option for a new gateway visitor information centre in the area of the former i-Site next to the police station on Coronation Park.
"It would tell the story of the rich history of the Bay and ensure people came away with a better cultural understanding," city councillors were told last week.
The Port of Tauranga would need to agree to re-route cruise ship passengers away from the current port gates and through a new gate in the port fence.
Design consultants Jasmax presented ideas for a combined public and cruise passenger information centre to a council workshop.
It would replace the temporary wharf-side information and booking centre, called i-Port, housed in converted containers on port land.
The council will decide on February 14 whether to include development of the proposed information centre in its 2017-18 Annual Plan. If it is agreed, the council and Tourism Bay of Plenty would engage with tourism operators and the community about the plans.
Jasmax said the facility would ensure that cruise ship passengers' first experience of Tauranga was special and emphasise the cultural aspects of the community.
A report to last week's meeting said the facility would cater to the needs of cruise ship passengers, coach tour travellers and independent travellers because Mount Maunganui currently did not have a dedicated i-Site.
Mayor Greg Brownless said Tourism Bay of Plenty's preference was for an iconic information centre.
"Something needs to be done to have something more satisfactory for cruise ship passengers."
But important questions remained to be answered, with Mr Brownless saying the council needed to have all its ducks in a row before it could make a final decision.
He said there were no firm figures about how much it would cost or who would pay, with estimates ranging up to $5 million.
Mr Brownless said he did not want to lump ratepayers with the cost and he felt the beneficiaries, the tourism industry, needed to play a bigger role in the funding. "It's time for everyone to play their part."
Other unresolved issues included the route passengers would take across port land to reach the proposed information centre, and where the coaches and buses would go because it was currently very crowded on Salisbury Ave when big ships came in.
One suggestion was that coaches would use land formerly leased to the Mount Bowling Club, with access via Nikau Crescent.
Tauranga's deputy mayor and member of the former council Kelvin Clout said if an iconic design was favoured then it should go on a site with high visibility. The best location for visibility was the other side of Coronation Park on the corner of Maunganui Rd and Nikau Crescent. The negative was the distance that passengers would have to walk from a new gate through the port fence.
Mr Clout said that although Tourism Bay of Plenty was keen to have the project in the 2017-18 Annual Plan, it would need a complete report with the questions answered within the next month or two. "That will be a squeeze."'
He said the main issue was that it was a working port.
"The port company has to take account of health and safety considerations, and they are quite concerned about that."
This season's 83 cruise ships will bring 153,000 passengers to the Bay.
Cultural elements of new visitor information centre at Mount Maunganui - Iwi and hapu would tell local and regional narratives - Narratives articulated in weaving and patterning of the ceiling plane - Ceiling plane conceived as a woven lattice under translucent roof