Work begins to open up Waiwhakareke Natural Heritage Park to the public

Monday, 11 March 2019

Almost 15 years after the first tree was planted at Waiwhakareke, the public will get unfettered access to the city's largest patch of native forest.

And the move has been welcomed by supporters of the natural heritage park who say opening up the 60-hectare site to the public could ultimately speed up the construction of a pest-proof fence and the introduction of native species such as kiwi to Hamilton.

Upgrade work to the park, located on the city's north-west outskirts, started on January 29 and includes the construction of a loop track, two viewing platforms and a toilet block.

The $710,000 project is expected to be completed by late June with an official opening ceremony mooted for September.

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Opening up Waiwhakareke to the public on a permanent basis will help people appreciate the significant of the park, supporters say.

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Hamilton City Council project engineer Leigh Cornes said the current upgrade to the Waiwhakareke Natural Heritage Park is expected to be completed by late June.

Waiwhakareke Advisory Group chairman Professor Bruce Clarkson said opening up the park on a permanent basis is 'hugely significant'.

Currently, the public has to arrange entry to the park via the city council as parts of the site are a working farm.

'There have been people who have been asking 'well, what's going on there?' because public money has been going into it and it's public land,' Clarkson said.

'The answer is we've been building the habitat to get us to the stage where we can now open the park. People will be able to see the amazing amount of work that's been done in 15 years and it will help get Waiwhakareke's story out there.'

The first native tree was planted at the Waiwhakareke Natural Heritage Park almost 15 years ago. Today, the park's forest cover 33 hectares.

City council project engineer Leigh Cornes said the current project is a response to city councillors wanting to open up access to the park.

Interpretational panels explaining the native fauna and the restoration project are planned for the site once funding is available.

'Currently, if you pop in and don't have the right knowledge of where to go, you can end up walking around for quite sometime,' Cornes said.

Waiwhakareke Advisory Group chairman Professor Bruce Clarkson said the park is the largest patch of indigenous native forest in Hamilton (file photo).

'This is about families and schools and people being able to come and enjoy this space, look at the natural flora, and understand the history of the park.'

The public will be able to access the park from Baverstock Road and Brymer Road.

Clarkson said Waiwhakareke is an example of how a native ecosystem can be recreated from nothing.

'If we're really serious about protecting the environment then the big lesson Waiwhakareke teaches us is you can't do it in a year, it has to be a long-term intergenerational project.'

Today, native plantings cover 33 hectares of the park. By comparison, Hamilton's Claudelands Bush covers 5.2 hectares.

The plan is to one day have a pest-proof fence around the site and a viewing tower inside the park.

'The habitat which we've created will eventually lead to the ability to do things like bring back some of the rarer birds to Hamilton,' Clarkson said.

'If we had the pest-proof fence now, we could be considering very quickly a few years ahead to bringing in some of these special birds. But even without the fence, we're making a significant difference to the biodiversity of the city. If you go there in flax flowering season, you'll see the biggest congregation of tui for miles.'

Clarkson said international visitors have been 'blown away' with the heritage park.

'We've had a couple of very wealthy international visitors who have looked at Waiwhakareke and said 'yeah, this might be the place where I could be prepared to invest some money'.'