By WAYNE THOMPSON
Manukau Harbour boaties warned Auckland Regional Council parks officers yesterday that they were in for a fight if they interfered with the Cornwallis boat ramp.
An inkling of a proposal to open up more foreshore for picnics, at the expense of the boat ramp, drew 80 people to a meeting at Huia yesterday.
They had heard through the bush telegraph last week that the ramp was to be moved from the left to the right side of the Cornwallis wharf by Christmas. The trailer parking area was to be shifted further up the hill.
Anglers told the Herald that the right side had soft sand that would bog towing vehicles above their axles. Boats could not be launched until half tide.
One angler, Lew Daltry, said there was no full-tide ramp on the lower north side of the Manukau Harbour other than Huia, which was constricted and at times difficult to use because of rocks.
Anger over lack of consultation and old suspicions that the ARC was trying to banish boat users surfaced at yesterday's meeting with council parks committee chairman Bill Burrill and senior parks staff.
Mr Burrill said the controversy had brought forward the public airing of officers' suggestions for revising the Cornwallis park management plan. The proposals were to have been publicised early next year.
He assured the meeting that nothing in the concept plan was set in concrete. Neither the ramp nor the trailer park was being closed.
The frustrating tangle of traffic and boat trailers and conflicts of use between visitors coming to picnic and to launch boats pointed to the need for improvements, he said.
Families were having to sit back on the grass from the shore because the trailer park took up so much of the foreshore.
It was not fair that boaties were able to occupy the best bit of the shore for long periods.
Mr Burrill said parks officers would consider the practical points and safety concerns raised by boaties and the Fire Service.
Speakers at the meeting said boating and fishing were important parts of harbour life. The Cornwallis boat ramp had existed since 1909.
There was plenty of room on the foreshore for other visitors.
They said that if the ARC was going to spend money on improving the park, then replacing two "long drop" lavatories at the ramp should be top of the list, along with a sealed road.
In 1994, the ARC closed the popular fishing wharf at Cornwallis because it was unsafe. It was replaced last year with a $325,000 wharf built through community fundraising and a grant of $181,000 from the council.
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