At its recent annual meeting, Michael Walker, who’s been on the board for the past nine years, including serving as chair for the past five, officially retired from the trust.
He’s been replaced by fellow lawyer Rosie Hill.
Other trustees who’ve ended their tenures are Wendy Pannett and Mark Townsley, with the latter now working for the Southern Lakes Trails Trust, while Brad Rowe has joined the board.
Walker tells Mountain Scene he decided to step down about a year ago, and the board’s since gone through a robust process in choosing Hill, who he says will be "brilliant" in the role.
His time on the board has been an "enriching" experience, starting out sitting alongside community big-hitters like the late Sir Eion Edgar, Tony McQuilkin and former mayor Vanessa van Uden.
"I was very lucky to have such good guidance and mentorship from those types of people at the start."
Although the delivery of new trails tends to grab the headlines, he’s found the behind-the-scenes work of setting the trust’s long-term direction equally satisfying, such as completing a rebranding in 2022 and approving a new 10-year strategic plan the following year.
Although the chair’s role can sometimes be "quite confronting", because board members don’t always share the same views, they usually get to a position of unanimity on most decisions, he says.
"It just depends on how long it takes to get there.
"I like the magic sparks that get created around the table."
The most frustrating part of the role has been delays in getting projects across the line.
"If you think about [the trust] in a company sense, the shareholders are the community, and everyone wants things done immediately."
A good recent example is the long-awaited ‘A7’ trail from Jack’s Point to Kawarau Falls Bridge, which the NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi promised for six years before telling the trust a year ago it had no money to deliver it.
"We’ve had to shoulder that, and often the community doesn’t understand we’d wanted to deliver it for a long time, but were told that someone else was taking responsibility for it.
"That can be tricky."
Walker says a Queenstown council-commissioned survey of residents earlier this year showed a lot of love for the Whakatipu’s trails and parks, despite wide discontent with other aspects of life in the area.
"It was really comforting to see those results ... the Basin really wouldn’t be the same place without its spider web of trails."
Trust not resting on laurels
While a key focus for the Queenstown Trails Trust at present is the ‘A7’ trail, linking Jack’s Point to the Kawarau Falls Bridge, there are other active transport projects also bubbling away.
According to the trust’s annual report, these include walking and cycling bridges over the Shotover River at Arthurs Point, and over State Highway 6 at Jims Way, near Tucker Beach Rd.
"Negotiations and permissions for each of these are well advanced and will make a significant contribution towards the ability of our community to get around the district safely by more active modes and, most importantly, escape from increasing congestion on our straining infrastructure."
The report reveals a 3.91% uplift in trail users in the 2024-’25 year, compared to the previous year, comprising 51% cyclists and 49% pedestrians.
The most popular in the network for the year was the Arrow River Bridges Trail, on which 177,633 pedestrians and 79,695 cyclists were counted — the Frankton Track and Kelvin Heights came in second (129,783 pedestrians, 74,054 cyclists), and the Twin Rivers Trail in third (73,945 pedestrians, 69,678 cyclists).
