Traffic, car parking and pedestrian flows will be monitored and measured in the Hahei and Hot Water Beach areas during the coming peak summer period.

The gathered information will then be used to provide more robust data for Thames-Coromandel District Council's Great Walks Project.

The Thames-Coromandel District Council will be collecting information traffic, car parking and pedestrian flows to provide more ‘robust data' for its Great Walks Project. Photo: TCDC

The Great Walks Governance Group, made up of representatives from council, Department of Conservation and iwi Ngāti Hei, signed off this latest work package at its meeting last week.

The work will be funded out of council's district, Mercury Bay Community Board and Coromandel Great Walks budgets

Council's project executive Garry Towler says collection of this data was a key recommendation to come out of the independent Traffic Management Report released last month.

'It's imperative we do this work, which we'll add to the existing data collection tools both we and DOC already use now.”

Parking occupancy surveys and pedestrian surveys will be undertaken on January 2, which past council data suggests is the peak day for summer visitor numbers to Hahei.

Once collected, the new data will be collated with existing data-gathering tools to help shape planning decisions to manage growing visitor numbers.

These data-gathering tools include DOC's track counter system for Cathedral Cove and council's tube counters for cars going over roads.

While to manage traffic and parking this summer, Garry says the Park and Ride carpark will be running at Pa Rd, Hahei, from December 27 to February 1.

'It will also operate over Waitangi Weekend 2016,” he adds. 'Traffic Ambassadors are also being employed to manage traffic flows at the Grange Rd carpark at Cathedral Cove and direct people to the Pa Rd Park and Ride.”

During last week's meeting, the Governance Group was also updated on four long-standing community projects, which tie in around our Great Walks project.

These are ancillary or maintenance work on existing tracks or sites with community, cultural, environmental and economic benefits for the local area and are situated along the future Coromandel Great Walks route:

• Logging of ageing gum trees in preparation for further planting around the stream along with farm fencing at the Stella Evered Reserve is complete. The Reserve on Lees Rd is managed by a private Trust but open to the public.
• Boundary definition and coastal planting along the route south of Te Pare historic reserve and Te Pupuhua Reserve has been completed with approximately 3000 native plants planted across 1.3ha. This is to suppress gorse growth.
• Works continue with iwi around the development and improvement of the track at the Te Pare Pa historic site.
• The modification of an old planned route through the Cathedral Cove Recreation Reserve to McHanns Bay (known as the Andlinger Track) can start before Christmas. This track will be a 400m loop back into the existing Cathedral Cove walking track.

For more information visit the Thames-Coromandel District Council's Great Walks Project website

Image: TCDC