$20,000 freedom camping fine plan

No-go zones ... large swathes of lake fronts are out of bounds to freedom camping in this draft...
No-go zones ... large swathes of lake fronts are out of bounds to freedom camping in this draft map attached to a new Queenstown Lakes District Council bylaw.
Freedom campers might be fined up to $20,000 for parking for the night on lake fronts within the Queenstown Lakes District Council's authority, according to a draft bylaw released this week.

The council will consider the draft bylaw in Wanaka at 9.30am today.

A map attached to the draft bylaw shows freedom camping is banned at some of the most popular lakefront spots in the district.

The banned areas include the entire southern ends of lakes Hawea and Wanaka and also extends up the west side of both those lakes.

At Lake Wakatipu, freedom camping is banned along two long swathes of the northern shore, between Wye Creek and Bob's Cove and between Twenty-Four Mile Creek and Mick Creek.

The banned areas also include wide tracts of land around the urban areas of Lake Hawea, Wanaka, Albert Town, Luggate, Cardrona, Queenstown, Arrowtown, Glenorchy and Kingston.

Freedom camping has also been banned on both sides of State Highway 6 between Pipson Creek and 400m north of Wharf Creek, at Makarora, while the Glenorchy freedom camping exclusion zone extends well back to Dundas Creek on the Glenorchy Paradise Rd.

Paul Wilson, the council's community services general manager, has recommended that the council adopt the bylaw, advertise it for public consultation and appoint a hearings panel comprising councillors Cath Gilmour, Lex Perkins and Jude Battson.

If that course of action is approved today, submissions would close on April 4 and the hearing could be convened in mid-April.

Depending on what the panel then decides, the bylaw could take effect as soon as May 31.

There has been growing sense of disgust in the district at the effects of freedom camping on the environment, especially with abandoned toilet waste and litter.

Communities around the country have been calling for stronger regulation before the expected influx of tourists for the Rugby World Cup later this year.

Before local authorities can opt into a national instant-fine regime initiated by the Department of Internal Affairs, they must pass a bylaw stating freedom camping is an infringement offence.

The key components of the Queenstown Lakes bylaw are that the no freedom camping zones will extend 2.5km from any residential-zoned land, that freedom camping will be permitted outside the banned areas where the camping vehicle has approved self-contained waste facilities on board, and that the proposed infringement is consistent with others being put in place throughout New Zealand.

 

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