North Canterbury News: November 16, 2023

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14 The NEWS North Canterbury News, November 16, 2023 Kaiapoi River quality rated poor since 2018 By SHELLEY TOPP The Kaiapoi River is unlikely to be safe for swimming ever again, an EnvironmentCanterbury(ECan) surface water quality and ecology scientist says. Dr Adrian Meredith's comment came after ECan’s Water quality for Contact Recreation:Annual Summary Report for 202223 showed water testedatthe Kaiapoi River boat ramp hadreturned avery poor rating since 2018. Dr Meredith said water in the Kaiapoi River was likely to have been heavily contaminated with bacteria for some time, from anumber of sources, that will be difficult to manage or control effectively, he said. This was because the river is fed by anetwork of lowland agricultural streamsand drains (Courtenay Stream, Silverstream, Ohoka Stream, Cust River, Cam River), and the drainage from the increasing urban area of Kaiapoi that drains into the Kaiapoi River. High duck populations along the rivers, and the high pigeon population roosting under bridges (particularly the Williams Street Bridge), are also believed to be contributors to the poor water quality. Dr Meredith said ECan has identified steps to make incremental improvements in controlling some of those sources. However, the reality is that those recommendations may never bring the water quality of ariver like the current Kaiapoi River into asuitableforswimming grade. The river is also atidal waterway whichcontributes to the problem by concentrating contaminants, leading to poorer water quality than more swiftly flowing rivers. There are also historic contributing factors. ‘‘The Kaiapoi River, through Kaiapoi, was originally the north branchofthe Waimakariri River, and Kaiapoi township was on Kaiapoi Island and suffered serious floods and flood hazards,’’ Dr Meredith said. Then duringthe 1930s the Wrights cut diverted the Waimakariri River more directly to the ocean and cut off both the north branch (Kaiapoi), and the south branch (Otukaikino), of the WaimakaririRiver. The original north branch would havehad generally very good water quality, he said. But after the Wrights cut was opened and the Waimakariri River ceased to flow through Kaiapoi the water quality ‘‘will have greatly changed’’. From then on water quality began to be dominated by the network of lowland agriculturalstreams and drains, and the drainage from the increasing urban area of Kaiapoi. Historically Kaiapoi River has also been contaminatedbyaseries of industrial dischargesinto the waterway. However the dischargesceased more than 30 years ago, and will not be impacting on high E. coli concentrations,DrMeredith says. Classy performance ... Conductor Dwayne Bloomfield with the Rangiora RSA Club Band performing the premiere of Armistice at Flanders Fields at the Rangiora Baptist Church Hall in Rangiora. PHOTO SHELLEY TOPP Score’sworld premier By SHELLEY TOPP Apowerful piece of music written to commemorate Armistice Day has been given aworld premiere in Rangiora. Armistice at FlandersFields, written by world renowned composer Dwayne Bloomfield, of Rolleston, was performed for the first time by the Rangiora RSA Club Band during aconcert at theRangiora Baptist Church Hall on Armistice Day, last Saturday. Two hours after the Rangiora concert, which was conducted by Dwayne, and received astanding ovation from the audience, Armistice at Flanders Fields was performed again, this time in Brisbane, by the ANZAC Brass Band, and that performance was followed by others in South Africa, the United Kingdom, Canada and the USA. Armistice at FlandersFields is the fifth WWI musical compositionDwayne, who is also musical director of the Rangiora RSA Club Band, and aformer Band Master of the NZ Army Band, has composed. He was asked late last year by the coordinator of the Armistice Day concerts, John Gardner, to write anew score to commemorate the historic day and was ‘‘completely sold’’ on the idea. ‘‘I spent until March just thinking about the shape the piece would take, and doing research, trying to find out when the last NZ casualties were, how many deaths on the last day, who were the last casualties,’’ Dwayne says. ‘‘In March Istarted putting the notes on to the score, and in August we tested the first half and some of the ideas, and by midSeptember (I) had completed it. ‘‘We tried it (at) the next practice and from there started visualising how it was going to work in performance.’’ From then the band continued to work on the new composition, and all the others in the Rangiora concert, right up until the day of the premiere. 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