Official Release – Napier City Council

Four years on from the November 2020 floods in Napier, stormwater initiatives are set to ensure the city is more resilient ahead of extreme weather events.

Napier City Council has spent the last few years ensuring systems are more robust, processes more efficient and equipment has back-up in place.

Napier City Mayor Kirsten Wise explains that a huge amount of work has gone into preparing the city for future events.

“We made changes immediately. Some areas of our improvements took time and money so when Cyclone Gabrielle hit in early 2023 it was another stark reminder that we were on the right path and needed to continue to prioritise flood mitigation and resilience building,” Mayor Wise says. “We have to make financially sustainable decisions and we have to protect ourselves from knocks and shocks. This work has put us in a far better position to do that.”

Councillor Keith Price, chair of the Council’s Sustainable Napier committee, says the 2020 floods in Napier had a catastrophic effect on the city and many of its neighbourhoods. 

“We have been working hard to ensure we have a more resilient stormwater system and can respond in a targeted and proactive way to the effects of weather events,” says Councillor Price. “It is about pumps, sumps, pipes and valves, but it’s also about people.

“We’ve done a lot of work ensuring our personnel are prepared, able, available and confident to carry out essential work in challenging conditions. Just looking at our weather response plans now you can see how important our people out in the field are when our community is faced with events such as these. Our Depot, SCADA, and IT teams provide 24/7 support to ensure systems operate smoothly during all events.”

Weather response plans include precleaning road sumps and pumpstation screens, topping up diesel tanks, and ensuring resources and personnel are available to respond.

MORE INFORMATION:

Since 9 November 2020, Napier City Council has:

1.     Installed flood barriers in some key wastewater pump stations such as Latham St.

2.     Set up six weather stations from Awatoto to Bayview.

3.     Put in place weather response plans to ensure systems are best prepared when faced with weather warnings.

4.     Installed cameras at stormwater stations to assist with monitoring.

5.     Procured 21 new generators, many of them mounted on trailers and fixed generators dedicated to stormwater pump stations.

6.     Set up online level monitoring for diesel tanks.

7.     Built a high-speed radio system to share information across Napier.

8.     Improved ability to pull data quickly to better monitor operations, and plan preventative maintenance.

9.     Installed new screens at the Onehunga pumpstation and soon to be installed – a culvert gate on the Expressway.

10.  Conducting a trial of Tetra Traps to improve stormwater management on city and suburban streets.