Almost two years ago to the day we completed construction of a 45 metre stretch of geotextile sand bag (geobag) revetment wall at Avana Harbour, to help protect the foreshore from erosion.
Monitoring of that work over 12 months showed that while the geobags were doing a good job of preventing erosion from the ocean swell, erosion at the Muri end of the wall was still occurring.
This was most likely due to the longshore current coming down from Muri as the water made its way to and out of Avana Passage.
To try and solve this problem, we applied for and received a small Smarty Grant from the Australian High Commission to add some additional bags to the southern end of the revetment and to also curve it inland slightly to prevent the longshore current getting in behind the geobags.
After getting technical advice from experienced coastal engineers and the final approvals from the National Environment Service, we completed an extension to this geobag revetment last week.
We used the same company as two years ago, S and T Contractors, to do the work of filling, placing and moving the nine additional bags into their new position.
On Wednesday morning this week students from Apii Takitumu and Apii Te Uki Ou joined us in a mutually beneficial exercise, planting the foreshore behind the wall to help its stabilisation.
The project benefited from having many young enthusiastic hands making light work of digging and planting, and the students got the opportunity to learn from experts on some innovative solutions to coastal erosion.