Mission possible

Joanna Davies | 9th February 2010

Friends of the Whau will unite with some big guns to ensure the estuary runs cleaner and clearer, writes Joanna Davies.

Most weekends, Gilbert Brakey cleans up rubbish and pulls up weeds around Whau Estuary.

"It's a lot better than it used to be," says Mr Brakey, who runs Friends of the Whau, a community group that looks after the reserves around the riverbank.

"But there are still areas that need work, but we need to be more organised to do it all."

So, Friends of the Whau, the Avondale Community Board and Project Twin Streams are  uniting to clean up the river that divides Avondale from New Lynn, Kelston, Glendene and Te Atatu.

"We're a very small project compared to Project Twin Streams, but if we can use their model for planting and organising the community, we can plan further, instead of just living day by day," says Mr Brakey.

"It will be much more efficient than what we have been doing, which was a bit like adopting a park and keeping it clean."

He hopes the joint effort will help raise awareness  among the people who live around the estuary. "A lot of people don't realise that every plastic bottle that goes down the drain ends up in the middle of the Whau."

Friends of the Whau formed 10 years ago to help  clean up  a spill from an industrial site that backs onto the river.

"One of the things that Project Twin Streams does is talk to landowners whose properties back onto the streams and work with them to look after the environment and help with planting," says Mr Brakey. "We want to be able to do something like that so we improve the whole river, rather than just the parts we have planted ourselves."

Waitakere City Council's co-ordinator of Project Twin Streams, Meredith Youngson, says the two groups' collaboration will help the Waitemata in general.

"While our funding doesn't cover the area of the Whau, we are more than happy to share ideas and help the Friends of the Whau," says Mrs Youngson.

"Our area and the Whau have both had a lot of nasty stuff in them and, while they are getting cleaner, we still need to keep working at it."

Duncan McDonald, of the Avondale Community Board, says the relationship between the groups will help spread the workload.

"It's a collective problem that sits between two councils, but we are going to keep pulling out the old trolleys and bicycles, and keep an eye on the water quality to make sure we are working forward."

Up the whau

Whau River is an estuarial arm of Waitemata Harbour. It takes its name from the native whau tree.  The northern end of the river is protected by Motu Manawa/Pollen Island Marine Reserve. After European settlement in the 1860s, the Whau was a marine transport route with five public wharves along its banks. Te Atatu Boating Club is based on the river.