Boffa Miskell's involvement focused on assessing landscape and visual effects and preparing a resource consent application required for the event. The work included planning and landscape assessments, as well as coordinating a team of experts in ecology, track construction, and event management to produce the Assessment of Environmental Effects. The primary resource consent requirements were for earthworks to shape the terrain and the installation of temporary structures for riders. Typical of a large event, the project required a range of amenities, planning for logistics, traffic management, off-site parking, food, entertainment, and facilities for television broadcasting.
The two main components to the project were the operation of an annual event for an initial 10-year duration, and the development of three new bike trails. These would provide challenging tracks and jumps for elite riders, while minimising landscape and visual effects on the ONL, and ensuring the venue had minimal ecological impact.
Early identification of ecology and landscape values ensured that the trails' designers could work with confidence to create alignments that made best use of underlying topography and less natural areas. This approach minimised physical disturbance to create trail features that worked seamlessly with the natural terrain. Further landscape mitigation was adopted to ameliorate visual impacts and reduce long term effects, preserving the integrity of the outstanding natural landscape. Incorporation of best-practice erosion and sediment control measures was an important component to the construction phase.
A significant challenge of this project was balancing the client and trail designers' aspirations to utilise the natural terrain of the site whilst preserving a degree of flexibility during construction. This tension between the Council, wanting certainty; and the client, wanting and needing a degree of flexibility; is not uncommon. Boffa Miskell's landscape design team worked with the trail designers to illustrate conceptual approaches for terrain features. Together with well-considered conditions, we were able to provide the Council with the confidence to grant consent without public notification and avoid the attendant delays and risks for the project.
