Marlborough Sounds residents unhappy over $160m road repair plan

Some Marlborough Sounds residents are urging the council to reconsider a plan which would see their storm battered road only receive emergency repairs.

A drop in meeting in Linkwater on Friday was the opportunity for many Moetapu Bay residents to put their concerns to officials.

Vic Koller has lived in Moetapu Bay for more than thirty years and said while the road at the moment is dangerous, there’s two main areas of concern.

“The road is seven and a half kilometres long. Don’t condemn the whole road. We want four hundred meters fixed… that’s it,” she said.

While Joe Roberts said he wanted to know what “emergency repairs” consisted of. “We still don’t have a very good definition of some of the terminology used in this Stantec report,” he said.

“But that doesn’t sound like the level of repair that we want, we want the road to be fully repaired”.

Another resident said he’s “not happy at all… the community feels as though we’ve been short changed”.

The meeting comes after the release of the Marlborough Sounds Future Access study which proposed options to rebuild the regions roads after storms in July 2021 and August 2022.

The study broke the sounds into five areas and proposed a unique plan for each. It’s complex but essentially most areas will have most of their roads rebuilt and strengthened.

The exception is the Kenepuru area which has suffered the worst damage. The Council is proposing a balanced approach which means an investment in road but also marine transport.

It essentially means most of Kenepuru Road will be fixed, but there’s two areas that are too challenging and they will only receive emergency repairs. One of those areas is Moetapu Bay Road.

Moetapu Bay Resident Peter Standish said if the road isn’t repaired it will have a big impact on the community.

“Insurers best case scenario we’ll see a rapid escalation of insurance premiums, worst case scenario they won’t insure a property at all. If you can’t ensure a property you know what will happen to property values.”

Kenepuru resident Ross Withell said the plan from the Council was as good as could be expected.

“I think they’re dealing with it as best they can. They haven’t got the money, there’s no way that they can get the money without it coming from central government.”

The review also proposed what it called ‘Hazard Adaptation Pathways’ which is essentially a backup plan, in the event of further natural disasters. It’s proposed that if something like another big storm or an earthquake hit the Marlborough Sounds would become much more reliant upon boat access.

Marlborough District Council has held a series of meetings this week to consult with the community about the plan with submissions open until July 11.