Windy Tops

Tag: radio

  • Preserving Outdoor Access

    Radio New Zealand’s Insight programme has looked at public access rights and the conflict over paper roads in New Zealand. The 28 minute audio programme can be found at the end of the linked page.

    Paper Roads are legal rights of way, effectively public land, but some aren’t practically navigable as roads. Some also go through private property, and have sometimes been treated as inconvenient or non-existant by owners of surrounding land.

    Conflict between property owners and people who want access through their land via these rights of way has been a festering issue in recent years. Several years ago, the Walking Access Commission was created, with a general role of liaising between the sides. I wrote about this in 2009.

    From its beginnings, one of the early problems the Commission identified that recreationalists were having was not actually knowing where they had public access rights to go. An early success stories therefore, in my view, has been the Walking Access Mapping System. That system collates together information held by LINZ and countless local councils, and makes it clear where legal public access actually exists throughout New Zealand.

    The Insight episode tracks down people on both sides of the issue, and it’s worth a listen for its presentation of the problems being faced.

  • Recap on the recent Milford Track accident – DOC’s Review

    Kathryn Ryan interviewed Allan Munn this morning on Nine to Noon (Radio NZ National). Allan Munn is the Department of Conservation’s Southern Region Services Director. The interview regards changes being made following the death, in May 2014, of a person who was swept away from the Milford Track.

    This morning’s 20 minute interview can be listened to here. It’s also been reported on in The Press, and by Wilderness Magazine.

    The incident which sparked this review occurred when the group were on the Milford Track out of the main tourist season, after many of the standard “Great Walk” style facilities are removed. It’s not uncommon for people to visit outside the booking season, whether to avoid higher hut fees or after having been too late to book at an earlier time. It remains public land with open access, and can be relatively safe with good preparation and advice, and an ability to assess conditions. The group didn’t seem to have been be prepared for the reduced facilities, nor properly aware of it. This combined with other factors probably led to bad decisions and eventually resulted in the accident.

    I wrote down some of my own thoughts about this a few months ago.

    DOC has now completed an internal review. It’s decided that safety processes are fundamentally sound, but certain things could still be improved upon. During the interview Mr Munn noted that DOC had “a range of contacts with that party” prior to the event. The party members either didn’t hear the available advice, or chose to ignore it and take their chances. In the face of this, there’s probably little that could have reasonably and immediately been done in that specific case.

    More generally, though, DOC’s review has acknowledged that there are problems with getting key messages across to the masses in the face of modern forms of media, much of which is out of DOC’s control. It’s also noting higher numbers of visitors of limited skills and experience aiming to walk the Milford Track during the buffer zone between the end of the tourist season and when the most dangerous winter conditions set in.
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