Council to develop carpark on Raglan heritage site

Waikato District Council (WDC) is planning to develop a carpark on a Raglan heritage archaeological site and reserve. The area is listed on the NEW ZEALAND ARCHAEOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION’s register as R14/171, Maori Te Awamutu Cavalry Camp Site, Raglan.

The archaeological record says that the area is known as Pipiroa and was a traditional Maori shell gathering area. There are several shell midden exposures along the seaward margin of the area in question. The midden is predominantly very small cockle with sparse pipi and occasional small oven stones.  A photo taken in 1877 shows members of the Te Awamutu Cavalry camped on the southern end of the site. The area is known to Raglanites as Joyce Petchell Park. The park commemorates Joyce Petchell, who was Waikato woman of the year in 1976. She passed away later that year after a lifetime of  community work, including being on the Executive Council of the Plunket Society of NZ. The memorial park was created by the Raglan Lions Club. The Petchell family ran the Raglan supermarket from 1924 until early this century.

A WDC report on the week’s Raglan Community Board agenda describes the carpark development with works proposed at Joyce Petchell Park and the Fire Station carpark. It does not mention that an archaeological authority would be need to be applied for to Heritage NZ and that work could not go ahead without it. The proposal shows the existing small car parking area expanded encroaching on the reserve. The effect is that the picnic area would be reduced.

In 2007, WDC applied for designation of part of the Joyce Petchell Reserve for construction of the Raglan Museum and Information Centre on its northern end. After a lengthy tribunal hearing, this designation was granted with a lot of give and take by all parties to the hearing. The ruling placed strict requirements on the remaining reserve area. WDC was required to undertake landscaping at the reserve. It has not complied with this requirement. The current proposal does not comply with the tribunal’s requirements apart from developing a raised footpath alongside the Wainui Road edge of the Fire Station carpark.

Waikato District Council also promised the tribunal in 2007 that it would develop carpark areas in Stewart Street as the main parking area for the Museum and Information Centre. The current proposal does not include this. Another report to the Raglan Community Board on this week’s agenda about parking in Raglan says the Council has no money to develop parking in Stewart Street. So it seems that WDC has no intention of meeting the commitment it made to the tribunal in 2007. In a separate proposal WDC is proposing to remove the carparks outside the Raglan Museum and i-SITE and replace these with a bus stop.