Waitaki Mayor Gary Kircher met Whistler, Canada, consultants Select Contracts on October 7 and said yesterday he expected a detailed business case for the first stage of an adventure park at the harbour would be ready ''very soon''.
''There will be more discussion with the public, but fundamentally - I don't use the word lightly - this is a game-changer for our tourism,'' Mr Kircher said.
''We've got a number of attractions: penguins; built heritage; Steampunk, HQ in particular; some of our natural environment around us in terms of scenery, rivers and lakes; but this is really some of the more 'adventure tourism' activity we are going to have. And that's going to be really important.
''It's going to help broaden our season, it's going to bring a good core base of visitors over the whole year.
''Those people are going to be interested in things like the penguins, and the buildings, and Steampunk. They all add to it. And those are three things you can't get in Queenstown.
A $21,000 study commissioned by the Waitaki District Council spawned the zipline idea and Mr Kircher said it would be used to attract private investment.
And with expected costs of between $1million and $1.5million, Mr Kircher said there were people, including locals, who would be ''very able to invest''.
The consultants, who worked on Christchurch's new $22million mountain bike park, had created a vision for the zipline that included how ticketing would work, where clients might disembark at the breakwater, where clients would don harnesses and how the walk, or ride, to the top of Cape Wanbrow, to be used as a starting point, could be included as a 40-minute tour taking in the history and natural heritage of the harbour.
''We're dealing with people who are experienced in this stuff and they are saying that this will be one of the world's great ziplines. Mainly from the fact that you're going above the ground, 5m above the ground, or whatever it might be, and then you get to the edge of the quarry cliff and the ground will just drop away.''
The zipline was envisaged as ''stage 1'', he said. But a via ferrata (iron climbing structures) was a possibility, as was rappelling down the quarry cliff, or an extension of the zipline.
Council parks and recreation manager Erik van der Spek said while the 26ha of council land on the cape was not entirely held as recreation reserve, the community largely viewed it as such and if a proposal were to go ahead the public would be asked for feedback.
Mr Kircher said he wanted to make sure the community did not feel ''surprised'' by any changes.
''People feel a lot of ownership, or guardianship around the harbour, and so [speaking publicly about the plans] is about making sure that they are kept in the loop as much as possible.''
He said he wanted to ensure ''good public access'' to the waterfront was retained.
