High seas at Te Awanga Point during Cyclone Gabrielle. Photo / Warren Buckland
High seas at Te Awanga Point during Cyclone Gabrielle. Photo / Warren Buckland
The people behind a new seawall set to be built at a popular Hawke’s Bay surfing and fishing spot say it will make the area better for recreation.
Funding of $735,000 for a 210m “ecoreef” at Te Awanga Point near Cape Kidnappers, renowned for its surf break and surfcasting, hasbeen greenlighted by Hastings District Council (HDC) in its 2025 budget.
It will protect the beach carpark and lagoon against erosion and inundation from the sea.
On Wednesday evening, around 70 members of the Te Awanga community, along with representatives from HDC and Hawke’s Bay District Council (HBRC), met at the Te Awanga Hall to discuss the options to help protect access to the Point and the community’s stormwater catchment area, better known as the Te Awanga Lagoon.
Following Cyclone Gabrielle in February 2023, the Cape Coast beaches were stripped of the rocks that usually populate the beach, leaving just low-lying sands and putting properties and council infrastructure at risk.
The local community came together in the wake of the cyclone to form the Te Awanga Erosion Group (TAEG), with the shared goal of keeping the community above water for as long as possible, as well as keep access to the beach available.
The group spent months researching the best options to fight the erosion threatening the lagoon and found the best-suited solution to their problem was to build an Ecoreef, a New Zealand-manufactured beach structure made up of honeycomb-like concrete blocks that are placed on top of one another to form a solid structure without the need of reinforced steel.
The model was presented to the HBRC’s Coastal Hazards Strategy, to make sure that the Ecoreef wasn’t in conflict with their projects, which it was not.
The TEAG then presented their Ecoreef proposal to the HDC long-term plan, explaining the problem and what the risk of losing the lagoon would mean for the coastal community. The HDC agreed with the urgency and logic of the argument.
A model of the proposed Ecoreef structure, set to be built on Te Awanga Beach by Te Awanga Point. Photo / Jack Riddell
“I think that one of our biggest considerations was the fact that we want to protect our beach, but also it was going to be extremely important to have good access to the beach,” says TAEG spokesman Morris Smith.
“We looked at all these systems and we actually did a swat analysis of all the particular projects or ways of doing this and we actually looked at Ecoreef as the best option.
“It provides easy access to the beach and that was our major concern - we didn’t want a brick wall or wall to stop access to the beach.”
Smith was also keen to point out that the new structure would have no effect on the surf whatsoever, with some concerns from at the meeting about a “reef”.
TAEG spokesman Roy Boonen said although the beach was quite full of rocks and stones at present, that could quickly change.
“It was only February ‘23 when we saw most of that beach disappear in 24 hours,” Boonen said of Cyclone Gabrielle’s impact.
Graeme Hansen, director of major capital projects at HDC, said before the proposal to build the Ecoreef, the council had been pouring gravel on the beach side of the lagoon on an ad hoc basis to try to stop the erosion via beach nourishment.
But the bulk of it was disappearing quickly, sometimes as quickly as a week, he said, describing it as “throwing good money after bad”.
Resource consents for the project are yet to be lodged. At present the estimated timeline for the build, if consented, would see it constructed in June 2025.
