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June 03, 2022
Punakaiki visitor center puts Ngāti Waewae in box seat
Adam Gifford
Posted On June 3, 2022
Download AudioWork has started on building new visitor experience centre at Punakaiki on the West Coast.
The $26 million complex will house a number of amenities, including the Department of Conservation’s Paparoa National Park Visitor Centre.
The Dolomite Point Redevelopment Project is jointly funded by DoC and the Provincial Growth Fund, with the centre to be owned and run by Ngāti Waewae.
Te Tai Tonga MP Rino Tirikatene says it’s a significant project for the iwi.
“For the first time we will be able to reduce the use of those terms Dolomite Point and put our own stories, our own korero and our own wonderful korero and names to all the korero and all those geographic places on the coast,” he says.
A feature of the new centre will be its green roof, and Conservation Volunteers NZ is raising more than 11,000 seedlings at its Barrytown Flats nursery of suitable native species collected from Dolomite Point and the wider Punakaiki area.
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