Te Mamaku Drive (Ruby Bay Bypass) Corridor Planting Project
A 10km long green corridor along SH60 between Tasman Village and Mapua, the so-called "Te Mamaku Drive", formerly the Ruby Bypass; that's the ambitious project of some local Tasman folk.
The project comes with access for the non-motorised public like walkers, runners, cyclists and horse riders. A stretch of unused, mostly public land on the eastern side of SH60 is visibly overgrown with gorse, broom, wattles and wilding pine trees. It already accommodates part of the"Dicker Ridge Walking Track" and continues on Stagecoach Road down to Chaytor Road and the Mapua's Dominion Flats.
The "Te Mamaku Drive Corridor Project", a sub-committee of TACA (Tasman Area Community Association), wants to connect the Waimea Estuary and Moutere Inlet with mainly native bush and trees. This would beautify the area alongside the Coastal Highway (SH60), as has recently happened with many highways in other parts of the country, reduce the fire risk and provide a corridor for birds to move between the estuaries and nearby wetlands.
A plan has been drawn up for the whole length of the corridor, with identified priority blocks to start with and to seek appropriate funding. This is a long term project to run over years, if not several decades!
What started more than a year ago with this simple idea has now led to the first planting of 1800 trees done on 500 metres at the start of the project at the Tasman end. Thanks to the great support and funding of TET (Tasman Environmental Trust) and Restoring the Moutere through the Billion trees programme, people can now envisage the direction in which the project is heading.
To continue further south another 2-3km to the start of Stagecoach Road, the group of enthusiastic people involved in the project is facing the challenge of removal of a long row of overgrown pine trees, applying for funding to clear about 8 hectares of land, securing about 30,000 plants and continuing with planting to be done over the next winter of 2023.
You can also make a kind donation to our Givealittle page.
Anybody interested in being involved in this project can contact Michael at michamarkertnz@gmail.com.
Read our full project document here.
We have just completed the first of two working bees in August 2022 to insert fertiliser tabs around each tree which will help our first planting Block 0 to thrive during this first year with a small team of loyal volunteers.
TACA would like to advise that the felling of all of the wilding pines along the eastern side of Dicker Road and the mulching of the gorse and scrub between there and State Highway 60 is now complete, to begin the next stage on Blocks 1 & 2 of our Te Mamaku Drive re-vegetation project.
We are delighted to report that we have made three successful grant applications for $2000 from TDC Community grants, $40,000 from Rātā Foundation and $3000 from Network Tasman which has enabled us to fell the pines and clear the ground ready for planting next year. We are still hopeful of a successful outcome of our Trees that Count application before the end of October and Lotteries grant application in November to allow us to complete the replanting of Block 1.
Our Givealittle page is still open to receive donations if you would like to play your part in our ambitious project. Every little bit counts.
We will be calling for more help over the summer with tree maintenance for Block 0 (completed in June this year) and during next winter once the new trees are planted to help with attaching just under 5000 plant guards and stakes for Block 1. Please contact Michael Makert on michamarkertnz@gmail.com if you would like to be added to our growing team of volunteers.
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