Big push for controversial Memorial Park to downtown Tauranga walkway

An artist's impression of how the harbourfront boardwalk could look from Memorial Park to Tauranga's downtown. Illustration/supplied

The controversial project to build a harbourside walkway between Memorial Park and The Strand has been given a fresh push by the wife of a Tauranga city councillor.

More than 12 years after the idea was first mooted, Devonport Towers resident Robyn Molloy wants the council to dust off its plans for the walkway.

"It has gone on for too long," she told councillors hearing submissions on the 2017-18 Annual Plan.

Mrs Molloy, who is married to councillor Terry Molloy, congratulated the council on the downtown's waterfront tidal steps.

''It is awesome and is already being enjoyed by young and old. Of course, the natural extension is onward to Memorial Park,'' she said.

She said the long history of the walkway project going back 12 years meant that most of the consultancy work had been done. There would be minimal impact on bird and aquatic life, and the walkway would lead to the reinstatement of beaches lost through erosion.

Mrs Molloy said funding was available through Government and New Zealand Transport Agency subsidies and possibly the Bay of Plenty Regional Council.

"Don't let a few residents of 5th Ave stop the walkway," she said.

Councillor Catherine Stewart raised the issue of residents who had riparian rights to the edge of the harbour.

Mrs Molloy said she sympathised with those people and understood their fears and anxieties, but others in Tauranga were living with walkways running in front of their properties.

"No one has exclusive right to our harbourfront and waterways."

She said in her submission that the $1 million of studies into the walkway only needed to be updated by the company which carried out the original research.

"Why pay to have it all done again - these reports are still relevant."

Members of the Tauranga Harbour Protection Society have historically opposed the walkway, arguing it would become a crime corridor used by criminals and troublemakers to gain access to properties.

Two years ago the society began using ecological arguments to sway public opinion, saying it wanted to restore the beach so it became easier for people to negotiate, build new public accesses to the foreshore and upgrade existing accesses that had fallen into disrepair.

The society said a lot of people were already walking the 800m at mid-tide, with members opposed to the construction of a structure like a walkway over a natural asset, saying it would be foolhardy from an environmental and amenity point of view.

History of Memorial Park to The Strand walkway
2007: Original design
2008-10: Resource consent granted and then withdrawn on appeal
June 5, 2015: Council allocates $30,000 to investigate consenting issues
June 8, 2015: Walkway joins list of potential projects for $8m downtown fund
November 2015: Funding deferred for consideration in 2018-28 Long Term Plan