Ngaio Crofton Downs Residents Association

Due to the move to Covid-19 Alert Level 4, we can no longer hold the lecture planned for 19 August on that date. If we reschedule, the new date will be posted here.

This year we are starting a lecture series on topics that we believe are interesting and important to our residents, and will provide some thought provoking debate.

In line with the Going Carbon Neutral project, that we and the Ngaio Union Church have begun this year, we have a loose “Sustainability” theme this year.

On 19 August, our Chief City Planner Liam Hodgetts will be talking about sustainability in city planning. This is particularly relevant with Wellington, with its long term plan recently agreed, and now heading towards consultation on the District Plan later this year. The District Plan is where the detail lies, on how the long term plan will be put into practice.

On 2 September we will be hearing from the Sustainability Trust. The Trust is where our recycling collection goes(see other posts – first Saturday each month), and they have some amazing programmes on which we hope to work with them. This is a very relevant topic given recent reports on the state of global warming.

These lectures will be held from 7.30pm at the Ngaio Union Church, cnr Kenya St and Crofton Road. Tea and coffee will be available afterwards – a good chance to mingle.

A winner from 2020, by P Moore

Last year we held our first photo competition, tied in with the AGM. It proved a success with over 60 photos submitted!, which you can view  here – Photos | Ngaio Crofton Downs Residents Association. because it was succesful, and good fun for everyone, we are repeating it again in 2021.

We are very lucky to have local photographer Colin McDiarmid (http://www.colin.co.nz/) as our judge again this year.

The categories for 2021 have been agreed – they will be: gardens, pets, and weather – a very wide interpretation of the categories will be accepted, and Colin will put them into one of the categories when they are submitted.

Eligible entries will need to be still photos taken in Ngaio or Crofton Downs, with no restrictions on date or type of camera. They can be taken at any time – if you have a favourite sitting in an album, then that can be entered as long as it was taken locally.

There is also no age limits on the photographer – all budding photographers are welcome to enter.

To submit your entry, email it to  photo@ngaio.org.nz and Colin will sort them into a category.  The deadline for entries will be Wednesday 10 November, with the winners announced at our AGM on the evening of 17 November.

There are prizes for the winner of each section, and all entrants will receive a one year membership of NCDRA.

We continue to post here the regular updates provided by Naylor Love for residents in the near proximity to the Bupa Care Facility being built at 122 churchill Dr

“We have now finished the structure and roof of the pool, and throughout this month we will continue to work through the landscaping in both courtyards and around the building. The scaffolding is continuing to be dismantled, the majority of the scaffolding will be gone by the end of this month as we complete the façade.

Last month, our Naylor Love team spent an hour around the Crofton Downs area, collecting as much rubbish as we could find. We managed to fill 14 bags worth of litter, and we will be organising another clean-up towards the end of the project.

At this point in the project, you will start seeing a slow decrease in subcontractor numbers on site as we get closer to the end of the job”.

The twinkling of the Matariki stars in the pre-dawn sky heralds a special celebration for young and old. Across New Zealand, people come together to remember their ancestors, share food, sing, tell stories, and play music – this is a time of looking back, of looking within, and of looking forward.

This year, Ngaio Union’s celebration of Matariki finishes on Sunday July 18^th with Stories Under the Stars – Sunday July 18th, 5:30pm–6:30pm – for children aged up to 10 to harness the power and magic of Matariki. For young families to enjoy the excitement of an adventure, and stories and songs, in the dark of the late afternoon.

Lights will shine, warming snacks will be eaten, stories will be shared, torches will be lit…

The first Ngaio Crofton Downs Going Carbon Neutral Recycling Day was held on 5 June from 10am to 12am on 5^th June at Ngaio Union Church. (see links at the end of this post for detail on what can be dropped off, and what happens to it)

Next collection day this Saturday 3 July, 10am to 12am at Ngaio Union Church

The two hours drop-off session attracted more than twenty groups, approximately 40 people, which was way beyond our expectation. People came with their families or by themselves, brought their collections and put them into the recycle buckets.

As shown on our website, we planned to collect plastic & metal lids, oral care, stationery, razors, wools, curtains and batteries. Look at how many we collected on the first day.

• Metal caps – 3.6kg
• Batteries – 3.2kg
• Plastic caps – 1.775kg
• Oral care – 1.28kg
• Wool – 150g
• Pens – 475g

We feel that this is a big achievement for our community first up, and will only grow as more people hear about our program! Obviously, the plastic & metal lids, oral care and batteries were the most popular recycling items because they were the daily consumption of each family.

We were so pleased by the many positive comments that the programme received, and that word of our programme had spread through our community. We received much positive feedback at the event and online, so  these collections are definitely continuing on the first Saturday of each Month.

We learnt that on one hand, the monthly drop-off opportunity would make the recycling easier for local residents. One gentleman told us that his family kept collecting plastic and metal lids and oral care items and this made it much easier than going into the city to deliver them to the Sustainability Trust. The local collection point makes it more convenient to recycle these small items.

We were also encouraged by the number of young people involved, all the way to one small girl who was sad to give up the pens they had collected. We hope that this collection will help educate our younger members about environmental awareness and community.

On Saturday, we enjoyed watching young kids being encouraged by their parents to learn the different categories of recycling and put the items into the right basket.

Also, people who missed the first drop-off opportunity let us now on-line online that they would definitely come to the next one which will be on 3^rd July, 10am to 12am at Ngaio Union Church.

Please spread the news of this recycling action around your community. Let’s keep Ngaio Crofton Downs Going Carbon Neutral!

Please note that we have added two more categories to support collections that residents already have – we will also now collect tags from bread bags and rubber bands from delivered Dominion Posts (just those from around the newspaper – they are returned to Wellington Newspapers).

Useful Links:

1. What can we recycle 
2. What happens to the collections
3. More information on the Sustainability Trust

Below is the July update from Naylor Love, regarding the Bupa Care Home construction at 122 Churchill Dr.

Our Tower Crane is scheduled to come down from Thursday 1st to Saturday 3rd July. We will dismantle as much as possible on Thursday and Friday, however this is weather dependant. Wellington City Council has been notified of this removal. We will ensure the use of stop-go signs throughout this period as per our Traffic Management Plan.

Throughout the month of July, we will continue to work through the interior fit out of the Building, the exit ramp is due to be complete by the end of this month along with the entire façade. The pool structure is nearly complete, and we have started making progress with the landscaping in both the courtyards.

On Tuesday 13th July, you may see our Naylor Love Team cleaning up the streets around Crofton Downs, we will cover as much of the area as possible. Each group will be have a bag for recycling and a bag for general waste.

Metlink have advised that due to a union meeting, these NZ Bus routes will be CANCELLED from 9am – 3pm, Wednesday 23 June. (More detail on affected routes here)

2, 3, 30x, 12, 31x, 14, 18e, 20, 21, 22, 81, 83, 84

Although some services are affected, Metlink supports drivers attending this important meeting.

We advise customers to make alternative travel arrangements during this time.

Any updates will be provided on the Metlink website and app.

This advice shows that route 22 Johnsonville – Mairangi – Kelburn – Wellington will be affected by the cancellations.

Around 300 trees in total have been ordered. About 150 trees will be delivered on the Friday before each planting day. Richard Grasse with help will lay out the trees in positions on the Friday, and we will plant them out on the Saturday. We will begin planting around 9am, and finish around midday, or so. Please bring a spade or grubber for digging the hole, and gloves for your hand protection. The planting areas are:

Saturday 19 June: at the top of Silversky, near the Transpower service road – access is via end of Downing St;

Saturday 3 July: at the entrance from Downing St – access is via end of Downing St;

There will be no planting at the bottom of Silversky, up from the ROW, which is now fully planted.

We will need to follow the WCC Covid19 plan for each planting. For this, I will record each attendant on a piece of paper, and each attendant should wear gloves. If you need a grubber, for example, please email me especially, and I will sanitise your handle. If you dont have gloves, please email, and I can supply some disposable gloves. Otherwise there is plenty of space for everyone, so please dont hold off because of concerns re the 1 or 2 metre rule. You should have gloves so that we dont get cross contamination when you handle the plants, etc.

If you are driving or walking, entry to Silversky track is at the end of Downing Street, up the Right of Way. Please do not park on the ROW which is private. Everyone is welcome. If you have not planted before, no problem, as lessons are available.

Hope you can make it, and that the weather is good for planting.

Cheers

Graham Weir grahamweir@xtra.co.nz 027 472 4260

Naylor Love have provided the following update for work on the Bupa Care Home:

“June Update: Bupa Care Facility at 122 Churchill Drive

We are continuing to work through the construction of the exit ramp at the Bowen Hospital side of the building. Throughout the month we will be using the entrance to the site as our exit also, our team will always remain on stand-by to ensure vehicles can leave the site safely, for larger vehicles this will mean using stop-go signs. We will endeavour to keep these disruptions to a minimum.

The crane will be coming down at the end of this month, we will be dismantling it over a few days and will send out the exact dates and further information around this closer to the time.

All our services trades have completed the first fix stage of the entire building, we are working through the final stages of internal lining and second fixing is following on from that.

We will send out another update at the start of July, if you have any questions, you’re welcome to e-mail us on: katie.burley@naylorlove.co.nz ”