STORMWATER DELIVERY - AN OPPORTUNITY TO RESET?

A. Wilks, F. Martin & L. Foster, (WSP)

ABSTRACT (500 WORDS)

If money was not a constraint, how would you go about delivering your desired stormwater outcomes and obligations under the National Policy Statement for Freshwater Management and for Te Mana o te Wai (TMotW)? Increase capacity through the upgrade and installation of new pipes, perhaps? This is just one example of an approach toward stormwater management still highly prevalent across Aotearoa New Zealand that can miss the opportunity to address the full suite of desired stormwater management outcomes.

Previously, policy has been vague regarding integrated stormwater management and desired water quality outcomes, prioritising drainage rather than healthy waterways. With TMotW, a stronger framework for the delivery of better freshwater outcomes across Aotearoa is defined. Despite this, the consensus is that we do not have enough funding to prevent flooding and support TMotW. However, this framework is not going away, and we need to shift our approach to stormwater management delivery to enable us to do more with less and create approaches that achieve multiple outcomes.

Using water quality and other healthy water identifiers as a proxy indicator for the physical aspects of TMotW, a qualitative analysis of the asset management plans and long-term plans of all 67 district councils was done. This showed that water quality is only mentioned by 54% of councils as a desired stormwater outcome and only 11% of councils mention improved water quality as the provided level of service. This reinforces the sentiment, received from a series of interviews with key industry leaders, that there is a lack of funding for water quality management under the current framework, with funding prioritised to reducing the risk of flooding across our communities.

The greatest limitation to give effect to TMotW may not be funding, it could be a continued focus on stormwater being a nuisance to be controlled, instead of transitioning our responses to more nature-based solutions for stormwater management. Although the introduction of the water entities may unlock some additional funding, a change in mindset will be required to make the funding work. Priorities and funding allocation will need to be shifted.

Recent catastrophic flooding events and the deteriorated state of many of our urban waterways show that our current approaches are inadequate to ensure we deliver positive outcomes for our water environments. TMotW seeks to challenge this. The scale of the change to stormwater management delivery needs to sink in, with sufficient funding to inspire people to act collaboratively to deliver on our aspirations for healthy waterways.

This paper will share the evidence to confirm that stormwater funding is not set up to deliver the enhanced outcomes communities expect from stormwater delivery. It will also share a set of key recommendations and lessons that a changing delivery framework for stormwater should be seeking to follow, and even improve on, to enable our natural water environments to be the envy of the world once more.