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Post by theycallmewade on Jun 17, 2020 17:01:35 GMT 12
All,
Just a quick note ahead of the public release of the Auckland Council Waikaraka Park Masterplan tomorrow.
This next phase of the process is where Auckland Council show publicly the results of stakeholder engagement on the plan since the last public 'have your say' process in July last year.
Thanks to the large number of people who took a few minutes to support motorsport at Waikaraka Park last time (77% of all respondents), the Auckland Stock & Saloon Car Club had the biggest seat at the table for input into the plan. You will see on Thursday how important this was.
This 2nd round of public 'have your say' will be open from tomorrow until 11.59pm on 18 August 2020 and is going to need a lot of support from the speedway and motorsport community generally.
You will understand why when you see the plan - it is likely to get a fair number of objections from NIMBYs and so will need an overwhelming positive reponse through the have your say web site to go through unchanged and set the direction for Waikaraka Park over the next 30 years.
Those following the speedway issues in Auckland, over the last decade or so, will know there has been an extreme amount of pressure on the sport here. While not as public as the Western Springs fiasco, there has also been quiet and consistent pressure on Waikaraka Park. 6 years and counting on the grandstand issue should tell you enough.
Like it or not, the public process has told Auckland Council that our sport's connection to Waikaraka Park is important; and like it or not overwhelming support for the masterplan will direct Auckland Council to keep it there for the next 30 years!
As soon as the website is open for submissions, I will update this post with the details on how to access the submission page.
Wade.
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Post by theycallmewade on Jun 18, 2020 11:31:18 GMT 12
OK, The Have Your Say link is open and can be found here: akhaveyoursay.aucklandcouncil.govt.nz/waikaraka-parkThere are two links to the Draft Reserve Management Plan and the Draft Masterplan in the text under "Waikaraka Park Reserve Management Plan and Masterplan". You can access these without registering to provide feedback. Take a look at these documents first. We are giving the Draft Reserve Management Plan a good read today and will come back to this thread with any thoughts about suggestions or comments we might make. You can wait for that update tonight or go straight in and make a submission now, but take a look at the Masterplan when you get a chance. I would be interested to see what you think. wade
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Post by petrolfumes on Jun 18, 2020 17:11:38 GMT 12
First concern would be parking and entrance way : by the pits taking over current carpark I cant see people wanting to walk from captain springs road round ( number 12 ) to Neilson street (Old pit entrance)
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Post by theycallmewade on Jun 18, 2020 18:02:42 GMT 12
It is not contained on the masterplan, but all the land from Alfred Street back to Onehunga Mall is going to be redeveloped. Panuku (Auckland Council's development arm) owns pretty much all of it and the final leases expire in a few years. There is going to be a lot of vacant land on Alfred Street for parking and longer term there will be properly formed car parks there.
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Post by John W. on Jun 18, 2020 18:49:48 GMT 12
Is the track larger? Or is it just new buildings taking over the existng pits...This might be in the plan - have not read it yet...Also, how many pit parks are there? Will spectators get to see more cars (bigger classes or more classes on a night) for the expense of a slightly longer walk?
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Post by midway on Jun 18, 2020 19:06:58 GMT 12
The only part of Alfred st will be the land that goes back to Victoria st which at a guess will be commercial zoned like it is ,but however it also could be turned into a housing development block like many others in the surrounding streets .. Yes parking in captain springs road wont entertain the elderly folk that enjoy the sport as well as security ,the hoons love the area ,, it does look impressive and i wish it well .. But i thought i read where this could take up to ten years to develop ,and is being run by the Waikiekie -Tamiki reserves board not really the Auckland super city council who tend to speak with a upper lip ..
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Post by theycallmewade on Jun 18, 2020 19:19:29 GMT 12
OK,
For the submission process, you need to register by giving your name and contact details. This remains confidential, but you will recieve a confirmation email and once the submissions close, you will get an email with the overall results - probably sometime in September.
The quastions relate to both the Reserve Management Plan and the Masterplan. Tick 'both'.
The questions are very basic and ask you to tick either 'oppose' or 'support' and there is a space to make comments for each question. You don't need to make any comments if you click 'support'.
To complete the questions take only 2-3 minutes, and there wasn't anything in the questions that I personally could not support. You make your own assessment.
On the Masterplan questions you may wish to add some comments if there are things you would like them to include. For example when it came to parking, I supported this but asked for additional accessible parking close to the speedway entrance that could be used when speedway events were taking place. In this way I did not have to oppose the plan to ask for them to include something important.
You might have other ideas that you would like them to include in a similar way.
It is quite a simple and fast process.
The more that respond the better - big numbers will really count this time!
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Post by theycallmewade on Jun 18, 2020 19:39:36 GMT 12
The only part of Alfred st will be the land that goes back to Victoria st which at a guess will be commercial zoned like it is ,but however it also could be turned into a housing development block like many others in the surrounding streets .. Yes parking in captain springs road wont entertain the elderly folk that enjoy the sport as well as security ,the hoons love the area ,, it does look impressive and i wish it well .. But i thought i read where this could take up to ten years to develop ,and is being run by the Waikiekie -Tamiki reserves board not really the Auckland super city council who tend to speak with a upper lip .. The plan is for the next 30 years and effectively secures Waikaraka Park for the sport. The development time will be dependent on funding and there are ways to deal with that, especially if the plan gets a lot of support. The Maungakiekie Tamkaki Local Board is the direct supercity council arm that runs Onehunga - so they are the council as far as Waikaraka Park is concerned. It is highly unlikely that anyone would try to place housing closer than Victoria Street because the speedway site is covered by the Waikaraka Park Motorsport Precinct under the Auckland Unitary Plan. To get a Resource Consent to put a house on Alfred Street, you first need to go through a legal process to change the industrial land zoning to residential in which case anyone who might be affetced by that can object and stop it. I don't think anyone woud go through the expense to try knowing there is a legally established motorsport precinct next door who will say no.
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Post by nakifans on Jun 18, 2020 19:46:45 GMT 12
I think we have to be overall positive towards the plans, the council is cash strapped and over the past few years their only concern has been Western Springs. It would be nice to sneak in under the radar and get positive improvements to the park at the councils expense. Would like to see a residential buffer , as we all know they could kill it off even though the park was operating before they built or brought. Thanks Wade for your hard yards and updates.
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Post by theycallmewade on Jun 18, 2020 20:00:57 GMT 12
Is the track larger? Or is it just new buildings taking over the existng pits...This might be in the plan - have not read it yet...Also, how many pit parks are there? Will spectators get to see more cars (bigger classes or more classes on a night) for the expense of a slightly longer walk? Ultimately, there will need to be a more detailed design of the bits and pieces once this gets through the current process. The track on the Masterplan is roughly the same size as the current track, although there is space in the 'track zone' to come back to later and get drivers involved in the actual track design. The pit space is roughly one and half times the area we currently have and is a more regular shape, so best guess at this stage wouold be 150 - 160 full size spaces. Again there is a next phase of design to come later for all of this. Need the plan approved first, and then worry about the detail later.
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Post by Speedway Central (David) on Jun 18, 2020 22:03:57 GMT 12
What happened to the plans of the track going other direction, so tracks main straights run parallel to Neilson St.
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Post by BarryB on Jun 18, 2020 22:34:56 GMT 12
A few questions Wade.
1/ so as drawn, the track is exactly the same size/shape as now, but just moved up the page slightly? Looks like more room down the Cemetery Bend end, and more room at the top? 2/ 160 pit spots you say. For the NZ Stockcars you'd need 180-200, so is there room to do something like how the expand out on to the playing fields currently? 3/ what's with the twin roads down Cemetery Bend end; is that like an entry/exit to the pits? 4/ is there enough room for dummy grids without eating into the pits spots available?. 5/ a new business couldn't build a facility like this without car parking could they? How can the council do so? Surely that will be the residents main complaint, their streets full of Speedway fans?
Barry B
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Post by theycallmewade on Jun 19, 2020 0:04:44 GMT 12
What happened to the plans of the track going other direction, so tracks main straights run parallel to Neilson St. There was a number of sketch plans drawn showing the various ways the site could be planned. The purpose of those was to evaluate the options and select the best option. The one parallel to Neilson Street was a non starter because it would have needed a major change to the Unitary Plan to change the boundary of the Motorsport Precinct. Even with a supportive council it would have been publicly notified meaning anyone could object which woud have caused more issues than it was worth. It didn't really work anyway because it would have placed the track facing straight into the setting sun on the straight.
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Post by theycallmewade on Jun 19, 2020 0:23:21 GMT 12
A few questions Wade. 1/ so as drawn, the track is exactly the same size/shape as now, but just moved up the page slightly? Looks like more room down the Cemetery Bend end, and more room at the top? 2/ 160 pit spots you say. For the NZ Stockcars you'd need 180-200, so is there room to do something like how the expand out on to the playing fields currently? 3/ what's with the twin roads down Cemetery Bend end; is that like an entry/exit to the pits? 4/ is there enough room for dummy grids without eating into the pits spots available?. 5/ a new business couldn't build a facility like this without car parking could they? How can the council do so? Surely that will be the residents main complaint, their streets full of Speedway fans? Barry B Good questions. 1 - As drawn it is just a masterplan. There is a lot of detail to follow and the track zone is big enough to make the track wider with moderate banking, but that is for more detailed discussion with drivers later so we can make it a drivers track. There is room at the cemetery end becuase of the Transpower Corridor under the power lines and leaving room for a big screen. The track zone allows both straights to be the same length as the back straight now. The size is more focussed on being a drivers track than a horsepower track. It doesn't need to be much bigger than it is now for that, but perhaps with a little more width and some moderate banking to get three lines working in the corners. 2 - The pit numbers are conservative based on having a lot more area than currently. It is a lot bigger than what we have now and we know we can squeeze in 120 to what we have now. The park is what it is and we can't make it bigger unless we try to change the boundary which gets back to a dangerous process of publicly notified consents. 3 - The twin roads are on / off shoots. The on road (around the cemetery bend onto the back straight) is wide enough for two lanes and would be the dummy grid for up to 40 cars. This leaves the off shoot area free for emergency vehicle access to the track. 4 - see 3. 5 - Spectator parking has been thought of. There will be opportunities opening up on Alfred Street soon and we all know of another Auckand speedway that has a large expanse of sports fields close by that is used for public parking. It would probably not be very helpful to be talking about or showing that sort of thing on a public engagement plan. But it actually helps things if people give feedback about not enough parking for speedway - that shows strong public demand and gives us more to work with later.
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Post by BarryB on Jun 19, 2020 9:42:59 GMT 12
Thanks Wade.
Barry B
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Post by theycallmewade on Jun 19, 2020 11:48:08 GMT 12
I have had a few questions since this plan has been made public to do with "were other options looked at? & why is the plan drawn this way?"
It is probably a good idea to explain how this plan came to be.
A lot of people will remember there was an RFA process to look at Waikaraka Park for a possible combined speedway facility. While that idea was abandoned for some good reasons, the RFA process spent 6 months checking all the legal and Resource Management Act rules to make sure the basic parts of the plan were not only possible, but would not come up against complicated or risky Resource Consent processes. In a single sentence, if everything stays inside the red Motorsport Precinct boundary line then it can be done easily.
So, in my mind, two very positive things ultimately came out of that process. Firstly, Western Springs is still a speedway and still in the game to fight to stay. If you give something up you never get it back. The second positive thing is the amount of great information and knowledge about the Waikaraka Park motorsport precinct that the ASSCC has been able to refine and plug into this masterplan.
The clever thing the club has done is to promote the idea of linking functions. For instance, the plan includes a lot of "combined buildings" where the identified need for more changing rooms, toilets, referee rooms, sports equipment storage etc is combined with some spectator seating for speedway on top. This way the actual cost of combining speedway facilties is only 10% of total cost of providing the stuff the park needs. Very hard to separate toilets for kids playing football from speedway spectator seating now. When it comes to getting funding, it is has been pretty clear over the years that the council find it really difficult to approve money for speedway, but much harder to stop funding for kids toilets.
In this way, just about everything other than the race track and grandstand replacement is combined with another identified need and has multiple community uses. This approach is straight out of the council's own policy statements to do with how they assess funding priorities. Single function or user = bad, multilple functions and community users = good.
We are not going to get any direct council funding for speedway activities at Waikaraka Park - that has been pretty clear for a while now. The council has just spent $8.9M completing the car park, roading and drainage at Colin Dale Park and are reserving a plot out there for speedway which is going to cost them a big sum if they manage to close Western Springs.
For us to be able to move forward we have had to put a lot of thought into the plan to be able to make it a reality. Integrating the speedway functions into things that the council will fund for the park and sports users gives that the best chance of happening. We think we have done the best we can so this will not end up being an excersise in futility or just pretty pictures.
But it will still need a very loud supportive voice through the 'have your say' website to get the plan approved without changes - that is the critical bit now and numbers really matter!
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Post by midway on Jun 21, 2020 14:01:02 GMT 12
I see where the new pits are situated leaving the question or two how are they going to stop the people walking through from Alfred st into the back of the pits and i guess the little stone wall will go pleasing the historic and preservation society . Is the existing main entry for the public going to be changed as well and blocked off . The back stone wall to the wooden wall in the park is about 10ft wide is this going to be footpath or by the looks of the plan used as a car exit from the track returning to the pits ..
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Post by theycallmewade on Jun 21, 2020 15:26:40 GMT 12
I see where the new pits are situated leaving the question or two how are they going to stop the people walking through from Alfred st into the back of the pits and i guess the little stone wall will go pleasing the historic and preservation society . Is the existing main entry for the public going to be changed as well and blocked off . The back stone wall to the wooden wall in the park is about 10ft wide is this going to be footpath or by the looks of the plan used as a car exit from the track returning to the pits .. There will be fencng to the pit area and the current public entrance will still function as a gateway from the pits to the spectator areas. It will also be an entrance gate for other public functions in the club rooms when the pits are a public car park and other community groups make use of the facilities outside of speedway events. The cemetery end will be for dummy grid and on/off shoots. Basically the area from the track wall to the stone wall will be a technical area and off limits to the public. It is the part of the site under the power lines, so not economic to build low capcity spectator zones here - much better to use it for race staging area and move that out of the pits and focus on town bend for proper spectator zones for those that like to sit on the corner. This is actually the orginal pit and track gate arrangement from 1967, although looking at shoots instead of gates takes the old problem of track gates getting damaged by stock cars in this location out and allows much faster access to the track for emergency vehicles.
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Post by screaminV8 on Jun 21, 2020 18:33:35 GMT 12
I take it by that you mean the perimeter of the pits area will be permanently fenced off so it is secure? Other thing I couldn’t see reading through the plans, was what is the actual intent with the Grandstand - noted as “Seating” on one plan, and also noted elsewhere as a Historic Building? Would it remain in its current form, or upgraded and only the upstairs is used for seating? (I understood the main problem isn’t it falling down, but concrete “blowing” off the beams due to steel reinforcing deteriorating?)
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Post by orapiuwharf on Jun 21, 2020 20:06:33 GMT 12
Hi Wade,
Firstly well done and thanks for all your efforts. it is appreciated. Secondly when you say shoots are you referring to where there is no gates at all like in the USA?
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