@size12 - No. "If public land is genuinely closed, and if you infringe on that closure by entering the land, and are caught, then you may be penalised."
If the legally prescribed process has been followed, DoC can legally restrict public access within a National Park.
There are penalties for breaking the law.
Question is, if it's just a "Hang on. Don't use this while we get sorted, please" notice that hasn't followed the legal process, then how binding is it ?.
Good section on this blog, from which I took the quote. ;) - http://www.windy.gen.nz/index.php/archives/764
(Sorry Izogi. Me typing while you posting).
This post has been edited by the author on 6 August 2015 at 19:15.
Kauri dieback is a good example but that is because of a different part of the Conservation act all together. There are other conservation reserves where access is strongly restricted for actual conservation reasons and those should be respected and can be enforced in court.
I have no problem with that although often there is not enough info readily available to let the public know about these.
Then there are conservation areas where Doc have given a virtual monopoly to a private organization by way of Concession effectivly shutting people out. An example is the hump ridge track in Southland. Access through the Doc reserve is not restricted but you wouldnt know it if you google the place The Humpback track operating company has a consession on the Doc reserve its own huts and a portion of the track in private land. To do the Hump ridge track you must use this company but to go to Port Craig you dont even though it is on this track.
Then there are times where Doc just declares something dangerous and closes it Not always obvious why. Blue slip on the Puffer track comes to mind. A section of track about 500 metres long closed but obviously still takes more traffic than the detour Ive only failed to get through that way once and that was only due to less capable people with us. Next visit would of been almost passable in a wheelchair but still marked as closed
Ah right, thats cleared it up. It does seem like in some cases they should issue an advisory rather than just saying that the track is closed.
They could be stuck between a rock and hard place. Health and safety act rears its ugly head again. If a track isnt up to the required standard and someone gets hurt because of it they could end up paying some of there funding to the Justice department
For hard core tramping tracks in the back country they can say "but only serious trampers go there and they like it that way" but on the front country tracks they are stuck with family groups including kids push chairs etc so have little choice but either maintain the track to footpath standard or appear to close it if they havnt managed.
One would think, or wish, that a notice could be issued saying your safety in the backcountry is yours and yours alone, and DOC bear no responsibility, however Im aware that it isn't that easy with health and safety being its usual painful self.
"Health and safety act rears its ugly head again."
I'd be interested if anyone has legal references handy. Where some kind of workplace is involved with employees or volunteers working on DOC's behalf? Sure. That's all about employers providing a safe working environment. But do similar legal issues apply to DOC for visitors just walking around public lands on their own terms? If so, where's the bit of law which says that's the case? (I'm not trying to suggest others are wrong but it'd be good to know.)
The main avenue I can think of is if DOC gives visitors an expectation that it's taking some responsibility for their safety, then it has a moral (and possibly legal) obligation to follow through. So perhaps if it builds and maintains and advertises a track, it has an obligation to ensure that the track meets the expectations to which it's been advertised. And DOC does quite a lot of advertising about where people can go on tracks.
In some ways I'd not necessarily mind seeing reminders at common entry points saying something very simple like "Remember that you are responsible for your own preparation, decisions and actions", and not much more. On the other hand that's probably just more signs so maybe not.
This post has been edited by the author on 7 August 2015 at 00:12.
"If a track isnt up to the required standard"
is there a required standard? what is it?
used to be you just used a track as is and took it as it came.
mud, windfall and all...
problem is now, you have more front country tracks than ever turning into footpaths delivering more people than ever to the back country faster than ever where there are fewer maintained tracks than there have been for decades.. where the inexperienced could get themselves into difficulty.
is it time to wrap the masses in cotton wool and say dont step outside the barrier...
its interesting, I joined a big city tramping club, there were a lot of older experienced people in the club who looked down their nose at me as a greenhorn , ignored me or told me what to do like i was a novice, they assumed because i was living in a big city and younger than then i didnt know what I was doing. someone said to me one day,, "we have to come out and rescue people like you" I should have got him to elaborate on what he thought people like me were,
and I was in my late thirties having started tramping twenty years earlier with a fair bit of experience in a variety of NZ terrain tramping with very experienced people a fair bit of the time..
so are we getting into the age of us and them? where those who have the power to decide what the public are informed is slanted because they think the masses dont have the ability to cope with the reality of a lot of our tracks? and should just be shut out of them through deceptive signage? and they don't want to have to deal with the issue of the occassional search and rescue when required? to a certain extent search and rescue is a sign you are living in a free country where people have the freedom to express themselves in the outdoors with limited restraint from the powers that be.
how do you get the experience then if you are sending a signal to people "don't". The powers that be will manage the risk and you do as you're told.
My understanding is that DoC have a set of service standards. Roughly track, route and accesible. Each one has parameters like grade, maximum marker distance, number of allowable puddles per km and such. Track signage in egmont is starting to get icons that indicate which std each track is.
Zoneblue you are correct. Over the years many tracks have been downgraded to routes and some tracks & routes have been dropped completely from the maintenance programmes. My take is that this is to do with both the struggle with funding and idealogical reasons.
And then there is Te Araroa! Presumably there must be extra funding for maintaining this track? On our recent trip along parts of it in the Richmond Ranges we were amazed to find someone had (fairly recently?) gone through with a weed eater/scrub bar chopping down the low tussock and occasional spaniard. This at a time when the huts are being used once a month or so and the vegetation is at the most knee high and very sparse. Quite off putting the way this lovely alpine vegetation was flattened around Slaty hut. Why?! (Let a man loose with a chain saw or scrub bar and its very hard to stop him! lol )
Sometimes DoC's use of their limited funds amazes me! Presumably somewhere there is a directive saying Te Araroa has to be weed eated every now and then?
