Wednesday, August 14, 2019

Drowning our taonga

The government has announced plans to move the Treaty of Waitangi and other taonga to a new site. Great news! So where are they going? Right next to the old one:
The new plan will see a new 22,000-square-metre archive built on the former site of Defence House - the former Defence Force headquarters demolished after the 2016 Kaikoura earthquake - to home the documents.

Huh. Isn't that close to the pre-colonial shoreline? I wonder how it looks on the Wellington City Council's interactive climate flooding map, with their expected sea-level rise of 1.5 metres?
ArchivesFlood

So basicly, the government plans to move everything to a site which will be on the beach within 80 years, and subject to erosion and flooding. I don't think that's a good idea. Instead, the government should be seeking to minimise its climate risk. And that means taking this opportunity to move the archives out of Thorndon, to somewhere well above sea-level. Like Karori.