Stream or Discharge: Using the Hydrosocial Cycle to Explore the Meanings of the Waimapihi Stream in Te Whanganui-a-Tara-Wellington, Aotearoa-New Zealand

Abstract

<p>Aotearoa-New Zealand’s urban streams are complex and diverse but have been degraded and neglected for years. For the most part, hegemonic management regimes are technocratic, separating streams into discrete parts, and thus have failed to improve or maintain the state of urban streams. The hydrosocial cycle is a way of exploring streams that takes account of whole systems, flows of water, more than humans, infrastructure and technology, and the social structures and institutions that make up water. The framework has been used to study the impacts of urbanisation on water around the world, including issues around stormwater, wastewater, water supply, and rivers, but it has rarely been used to study buried urban streams. This research uses a case study of the Waimapihi Stream in Te Whanganui-a-Tara-Wellington, Aotearoa-New Zealand to explore how the hydrosocial cycle could be used to understand urban streams. A hydrosocial approach, alongside a more-than-human methodology, demonstrated the varying meanings of the stream, including those of the different phases along its length. Connections to the buried section of the Waimapihi arose through the presence of fish, physical markers, and stories, but there was dissatisfaction with the extent of these. As a result, alternative methods of connection such as windows to the stream and areas of it to be daylighted were explored. A hydrosocial approach enabled an examination of meanings and values of the Waimapihi Stream; to encourage critical analysis of how streams are defined and how they are managed. This demonstrated that the hydrosocial cycle provides a valuable framework for understanding urban streams, as it encompasses the various components that make up urban streams and is flexible enough to explore the diversity between and within them. Key words: Hydrosocial cycle, more-than-human, stormwater, wastewater, urban streams, Te Whanganui-a-Tara-Wellington, Aotearoa-New Zealand.</p>

Restoration as reconnection: a relational approach to urban stream repair in Te Whanganui-a-Tara Wellington, Aotearoa New Zealand

“…There is little scholarship concerned with Waimapihi Reserve. To my knowledge, McLean's (2020McLean's ( , 2022…”

“…In 1841, despite a lack of evidence of any form of land tenure, Baker Polhill settled and established a timber business in the present-day suburb of Aro Valley, leading to the area being known as 'Polhill's Gully' (Brassel, 2014). This area is also the catchment where Waimapihi Stream's headwaters are located, from which it originally ran across an open floodplain past Te Aro Pā and into the sea in Te Whanganui-a-Tara (McLean, 2020). In te reo Māori, the name Waimapihi at once refers to the water of the stream (wai) and Ngāi Tara and Ngāti Mamoe rangatira Māpihi, who is understood to have bathed in it near the headwaters in what is now the reserve (McLean, 2022).…”

“…In place of native bush, gorse (a species of plant introduced by colonial European settlers) had taken over (Brassel, 2014). At the same time, a combination of human and non-human-induced factors including a major flooding event in 1853, an earthquake in 1855, and the use of the stream as a depository for sewage from the urban environment, led to colonial European perceptions of the stream as a risk to (and nuisance to the development of) urban infrastructure and public health (McLean, 2020). As parcels of land surrounding the stream were gradually sold for reclamation and urban development, it was buried in sections until completely subsumed into the city's stormwater infrastructure in the late 1890s (McLean, 2020).…”

“…Initiatives to daylight urban streams have been undertaken in Aotearoa New Zealand on few occasions (see : Liptrot, 2013;Lewis et al, 2014;Neale & Moffett, 2016). More recently, the practice has re-entered public discourse in the wake of severe flooding events in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland (Madden-Smith, 2023), and as political leaders and researchers have provoked ideas of daylighting Waimapihi Stream (Green, 2022;McLean, 2020McLean, , 2022. In the academic literature, stream daylighting is typically approached from the perspectives of engineering, urban design, and restoration ecology.…”

“…The final contribution of this research is an expanded understanding of the meanings of Waimapihi Stream and imaginations of living alongside it above ground. In imagining the future of Waimapihi stream, participants predominantly focused on ideas of stream daylighting, resonating with McLean (2020McLean ( , 2022. McLean (2022: p. 19) writes:…”