A site in Lismore Park, Plantation Rd, has been earmarked by the New Zealand Fire Service Commission for Wanaka's fire siren.
The commission's application for resource consent has been notified by the Queenstown Lakes District Council.
In the application prepared by Duncan White, of Paterson Pitts Group, the site is identified as being next to the water reservoirs on the highest point of Lismore Park, close to Plantation Rd.
The existing siren is on the roof of the fire station in Ardmore St, but the station will be sold when the Wanaka Volunteer Fire Brigade moves into a new station in Ballantyne Rd.
In the application, Mr White said the new station would not have a siren because it was located in ''the base of a bowl'' and the topography would limit sound coverage.
Volunteer firefighters responded to emergency call-outs from cellphones, pagers and the siren, Mr White said.
''A siren is still considered by the [New Zealand] Fire Service to be the most effective method of summonsing volunteers. Volunteers do not always wear or hear cellphones or pagers, and these rely on technology.''
Mr White said a siren was also the only ''instantaneous method'' of alerting Wanaka residents to a civil defence emergency and getting them to switch on their radios for further instructions.
He noted the need for the siren to be located where it could be heard across an expanding Wanaka township.
The siren would be capable of producing 129dBA at 1m and will be oriented towards Beacon Point to the north and the Cardrona Valley to the south.
For an emergency fire call, the siren sounded for a maximum of one minute.
Between 9pm and 7am, it was delayed by four minutes to allow volunteers time to respond to pagers and cellphones.
''This delay normally provides sufficient time for the first volunteer to arrive and cancel the siren before it sounds,'' Mr White said.
The brigade responded to about 130 calls per year, of which about 40 were at night.
Mr White noted residents in houses in Hillview Pl and Plantation Rd nearest the proposed new siren site would experience noise at levels ''sufficient to interrupt sleep and conversations''.
Public submissions to the council close on December 17.
