Heaphy Track widening only restoration

Press, 21 April 1984, Page 8

Heaphy Track widening only restoration

PA Wellington The Forest Service is steadily converting the 70km Heaphy Track in Nelson into a road, according to a lobby group, Action for Environment. It said yesterday the track was being r‘developed” in a way that allowed Forest Service Staff to drive along the track “supposedly for track and hut maintenance purposes.” “We see this work as the thin end of the wedge,” the group said. The work could lead to equestrian use of the track or allow trail bikes and four-wheel-drive vehicles in. The group also said the work could lead to more inadequately - equipped people attempting to walk the track, “This can only result in more rescue operations and more fatalities.” The group has asked the Minister of Forests, Mr Elworthy, to have all widening on the track stopped. The Acting Conservator of Forests for the Nelson

district, Mr Brian Collins, said last evening that there was “no way” that the track was being made into a road. Forest Service staff were widening the track at the moment, so that it could be built up and given proper drainage to make it a “first class walking track,” he said. “We are restoring the track to its original condition,” he said. Over the years, many parts of the Heaphy Track had become like quagmires, he said, and all the Forest Service was doing was getting rid of that. ‘ln a few years the bush will have encroached back on to the track and most people would not know the work had been done at all. The work will ensure the track gives pleasure to the public for years,” said Mr Collins. He said that for every person who criticised the work being done on the track, there were “a dozen or more” in support of it.