First Mangawhai wastewater connections just months away

The construction of Mangawhai’s $53 million wastewater treatment scheme is on target for an August 2009 completion date, with initial wastewater connections likely to start in April.

The project started 12 months ago and close to 90 percent of the public sewers are complete. The focus is now on the construction of the treatment plant in Mangawhai Park, behind the golf course, and the installation of the 11km water transfer pipeline to Council’s Brown Road farm. The storage dam on the farm for reclaimed water will be also built this summer and preparation work has started on the site.

EcoCare Community Liaison Officer Melanie Smith says progress on all aspects of the project has been good, although wet conditions through winter were challenging.

“The community has been very supportive, which we have appreciated,” she says. “Most concerns have surrounded the reinstatement of properties in sewered areas. While we are trying to get this done as soon as possible, there are constraints.

“Our priority remains on ensuring safe access to property is maintained followed by reinstating paved and grass areas and then planting and other landscaping works.”
Of the 1200 properties in the initial contract, about 30 percent will need an on-site grinder pump. Most of these properties will be eligible for subsidy.

However, Melanie says since the project was conceived in 2002 some properties have subdivided. These property owners, if not on a gravity fed system, will not be eligible for the subsidy.

“There’s been a lot of development in Mangawhai since 2002 and we are currently looking at 20 different contract variations or modifications to connect these new subdivisions. We hope to connect as many of these lots as possible to the system, within the budget we have. Altogether, we are looking at possibly 2500 connections.”
More than 150 people are employed on the project and Melanie says there has been a flow-on of work to local contractors such as drainlayers.

“Part of our brief has been to design the individual connection of each property to the system. Through this process we have often picked up existing problems, which have been referred to property owner for private contractors to deal with.”

Pedro on the digger and Dwayne on the spade are among 150 workers involved in the Mangawhai EcoCare project.