'Like porridge slipping off hill': Massive repair bill for Tasman
The clean-up has been continuing in the waterlogged district at the top of the South Island following a month of historic rainfall, culminating in last week's destructive storm that has caused widespread damage.
The costs have already been swelling, with up to $500,000 absorbed daily on fixing the local roading network.
The state of emergency is expected to be lifted tomorrow ahead of a one-month recovery transition period.
The council's community infrastructure and group recovery manager Richard Kirby told RNZ's Morning Report programme today the district 's infrastructure was facing a repair bill of "between $20 to 25 million" and about 40 roads remain shut.
"Up to 200 people, about 15 heavy machines and trucks, all over the district opening roads," he said.
"Hopefully we'll have them open in the next couple of weeks."
The most arduous obstacle for council contractors was the type of material they had to shift, particularly in the Motueka Valley.
"It's just like porridge slipping off the hills. As soon as they push it more comes down," Kirby said.
"That's an ongoing challenge. It's all on at the moment."
There were further challenges underneath slips where roads had been washed out and bridge approaches, Kirby said.
In Kaiteriteri, a geotechnical assessment was needed to ensure a slip could be stabilised and the damaged road beneath reinstated.
Kirby said the busier roads presented the biggest challenges, compared to the quieter back-country roads.
He later told RNZ that the annual budget would likely be all gone by next month.
Earlier on Morning Report , he said the council would be requesting financial assistance from the New Zealand Transport Agency/Waka Kotahi.
"We'll be making a bid to NZTA and seeing if we can get some extra subsidy.
"Although we're opening roads, we still have to go back and do permanent repairs. That'll probably take 18 months or even two years to complete."
The council said a critical stopbank in the Motueka Valley had "held up really" well following government-funded upgrades.
Some erosion of stopbanks had occurred in Tapawera area on the Motueka and Motupiko rivers.
"The river teams are up there just to see what urgent areas need repaired in the event we have another rainfall," Kirby said.
"They're prioritising what work they need to do to get some resilience into those riverbanks." Produce prices tipped to spike
A fruit and vegetable delivery company is warning of a spike to the cost of vegetables around the country following the destructive weather.
Produce prices would sharply increase in the coming months due to the knock-on effects of widespread flooding, particularly in the Tasman district.
Angus Simms, the co-founder of fruit and vegetable rescue company Wonky Box, told Morning Report the effects would not be felt for another two to three months.
After a string of bad weather in recent weeks across the top of the South Island, growers have reported a delay in planting, he said.
"The immediate effects we haven't necessarily seen. Growers have been able to get into fields, they've been able to harvest. They've been able to make that work.
"Whereas actual planting delays will be happening here which is going to have an ongoing effect later on down the line."
Simms said the shortage would be likely be seen with green vegetables such as cauliflower and broccoli, and less so with root vegetables.
Produce had begun to "steady out" at a retail level following Cyclone Gabrielle, which devastated parts of the North Island in February 2023.
"What we're seeing in the green space already is greens are slowing and values are coming back for growers," Simms said.
Fruit production is considered a jewel in the Tasman district's local economy and a major export industry.
Harvesting of fruit products including apples and pears finished a few months ago, Simms said.
"Anything that's already been picked and harvested has been stored," he said.
"The products that have been stored tend to be safe."
Some fruit growers were facing repairs of their infrastructure ahead of next season, he said.
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an hour ago
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Otago Daily Times
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How can they send messages to everyone's phones? And why are there glitches? Alerts use cell broadcast technology known as geotargeting to send alerts through cell towers in a selected area - which can be the entire country, as in Sunday's test, or down to a small section of a city. New Zealand's system was provided by Dutch company one2many, which is now a division of Everbridge Public Warning, an American software company that specialises in alert systems. In a description of their technology, Everbridge says "one message can be sent to millions of devices within a target area in seconds". "A really oversimplified way of putting it, it's like a signal that your phone picks up, which is almost like radio," NEMA communications manager Anthony Frith said. When an alert is issued, the agency involved will select how big a region is covered, depending on the specific crisis. "The operator who sends the emergency alert will draw a polygon around that area, a shape they need to make sure is big enough to capture cell phone towers in the perimeter," Frith said. Auckland Emergency Management general manager Adam Maggs said, while targeted messages work well, who gets them varies, depending on a variety of factors. "In terms of one person [in a household] receiving a message and another not, this could be due to being just outside of the geographically targeted area. The boundary for the geotargeted area is not a 'hard' boundary and there can be message leakage, depending on the location of cell towers. "Other reasons include having a phone that may be older or has missed a software update, or the phone may not have had mobile reception." How do they know my phone number, anyway? They don't. The system uses the cellphone network as a carrier of the notifications that NEMA or other emergency agencies send out. "Our system does not have any telephone numbers," Frith confirmed. "Once we've transmitted the message from our portal, it then goes to the cell towers." I hate that phone noise, can't I opt out? No. You can't choose not to receive an emergency alert - after all, the point is that it's meant to be used for an emergency. Because it's sent out over cell phone towers, there's no 'list' of names on it to be removed from. The flurry of alerts sent out in Auckland in April saw some backlash on social media. "We often receive feedback from Aucklanders asking to be removed from the EMA system [which is not possible]," Maggs said. "We get just as much feedback thanking us for an alert or update. This will always be the case and we are fine with that. "At the end of the day, our goal is to help Aucklanders stay as safe as possible in times of emergency and we will continue to work hard to ensure that."
