The implementation of the natural hazards adaptation strategy for the Head of Lake Whakatipu area will begin in mid-2025 by the Strategy’s partners: Otago Regional Council (ORC), Queenstown Lakes District Council (QLDC) and Civil Defence Emergency Management (CDEM) Otago as well as the community, individuals, private assets owners and business owners.

Progress of the strategy implementation will be shared and updated on this page periodically as well as through community engagement sessions and/or programme newsletters. 

How do we monitor the progress?

The following are key activities ORC will undertake to support the monitoring of the progress: 

  1. Develop a monitoring tool (by August 2025) to record the responsibilities, start and end dates, and status of each action (outlined in Action Plan) led by each strategy partner. 
  2. Create and share a simple progress reporting template with all strategy partners to be used for submitting updates to ORC every six months. 
  3. Organise monthly meetings with strategy partners to discuss progress and address any challenges during the implementation of the strategy. 
  4. Compile progress updates from strategy partners and publish them on this webpage. 
  5. Present progress in both narrative and visual formats such as summary reports or infographics. 
  6. Hold an annual learning review workshop which gives all partners an opportunity to reflect on what is working and agree on any necessary adjustments. 
  7. Share progress with community members in accessible ways such as mailbox flyers and newsletters or set up community presentations (online or in person) or drop-in sessions.
  8. Establish open channels such as programme email address or phone number for timely feedback from strategy partners and communities throughout the implementation phase.
  9. Conduct a comprehensive review every six years to ensure the Strategy remains relevant and effective, based on insights from monitoring changes in socio-economic, environmental or institutional conditions. It may be conducted earlier if an urgent need arises.  

Who does what?

Community, individuals, private asset owners and business owners play an important role in this Strategy. This includes: 

  • Supporting emergency planning and responses efforts 
  • Arranging appropriate insurance for their businesses and properties. 
  • Staying engaged with updates and sharing local knowledge when appropriate. 
  • Taking personal responsibility for managing the risks to themselves, their families and their assets. 

QLDC carries out their activities through plans such as Long-term Plan, Spatial Plan and District Plan. This includes: 

  • Managing public assets 
  • Planning for emergency and recovery 
  • Supporting community wellbeing and identifying where homes, businesses, and infrastructure should be located. 
  • Making sure that development avoids hazard-prone areas. 
  • Applying zoning, land use rules, and building controls. 

ORC is responsible for: 

  • Managing rivers and flood protection schemes 
  • Monitoring environmental conditions and flood risk 
  • Providing flood forecasting and warnings. 
  • Supporting emergency planning. 

CDEM Otago leads and coordinates the four Rs of emergency management: 

  • Reduction, Readiness, Response, and Recovery. 
  • It also supports local communities in preparing for and responding to emergencies. 

 

Action Plan

Governance and collaboration

 

Status 

Action 

Goal this contributes towards 

Agency responsible 

Time frame 

Underway or planned 

ORC and QLDC collaborate to develop a governance framework or memorandum of understanding (MoU) for addressing adaptation issues at the Head of the Lake and/or across the district, including the implementation of adaptation actions to improve resilience. 

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards) 

Queenstown Lakes District Council 

 

Underway or planned 

ORC to partner with mana whenua to ensure mana whenua values and aspirations and mātauraka Kāi Tahu is embedded into decision-making and implementation of the Strategy, following the lead of Aukaha and Te Ao Mārama. 

All goals 

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards) 

Aukaha and Te Ao Mārama Inc 

 

Underway or planned 

Work together with QLDC, Otago CDEM, mana whenua and local community to ensure coordinated and consistent approach to implementation of actions aligning with this Strategy. 

All goals 

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards) 

Queenstown Lakes District Council 

Civil Defence Emergency Management Otago 

Aukaha and Te Ao Mārama Inc 

Glenorchy Community Association  

 

Underway or planned 

Work together to mainstream adaptation across ORC work programmes and ensure our work aligns with this Strategy and towards achieving each goal. 

All goals 

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards, Environmental Implementation, Engineering, Integrated Catchment Management) 

Ongoing 

Information gathering and monitoring 

 

Status 

Action 

Goal this contributes towards 

Agency responsible 

Time frame 

Existing 

ORC to Investigate hazards and risks as part of usual business.  

1, 2  

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards) 

Ongoing 

New 

Geomorphic change monitoring and assessment 

Maintain an awareness of locations and scale of geomorphic changes (e.g., active river channel position, bed levels and rates of change) which may have direct impacts or exacerbate natural hazard characteristics.  

Collect LiDAR, aerial imagery - spatial extent to include at least Dart, Rees, and Buckler (at least extent of 2019 survey). 

Cross section survey and/or bathymetric LiDAR.  

Undertake geomorphic change detection analysis. 

Notes: The monitoring is not restricted to the Head of Lake Whakatipu area and assessments may be at catchment scale, if appropriate. 

This information will: 

Enable proactive response to issues.  

Enable the updating of flood hazard assessments to ensure they provide representation of current conditions (e.g., bed levels). 

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards) 

with external support 

Periodic (at least every 5 years) or when new LiDAR is available 

Existing 

Data collection to document major flooding (or other hazard) events 

Improve the recording and understanding of hazard event characteristics (e.g., floodwater extents, depths and flow pathways), and the impacts of those events. 

The types of data collected will depend on the hazard and the impact and may include the following: 

Post-event LiDAR.  

During-event or immediately post-event aerial imagery. 

During-event or post-event observations (on-ground inspections and/or drone imagery). 

Develop an online data portal to enable collation of crowdsourced natural hazard event observations (e.g., photographs). 

On-ground post-event survey (debris survey). 

Assessments/observations of damages/impacts (infrastructure, or residential). 

Geotechnical assessments. 

Post-earthquake assessments (e.g., landsliding, liquefaction, subsidence). 

This information will: 

Assist with hazard/risk assessments by providing ground-truthed observations of hazard events. 

Be valuable for calibration/validation of future hazard modelling, helping to ensure models represent reality. 

2, 3 

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards) 

with external support 

After hazard events 

 

Monitoring and analysis of signals/triggers/thresholds 

SIGNALS – give us a heads up about changes 

Growth in costs to maintain and repair assets. 

Lower level of service (e.g., due to delta growth, riverbed aggradation, channel movement). 

Frequency, number or impacts of flooding events reaching nuisance level (this signal includes residential areas, roads and agricultural land). 

Movement of active river channel towards high value areas and assets 

Negative impacts on community wellbeing (e.g., concern and anxiety, increased demand for protection or for doing things differently). 

Insurance affordability or coverage 

TRIGGERS – points where review and decisions are made 

Decision-making cycles (3-year, 10-year, 30-year) 

Opportunities 

Significant natural hazard event with unacceptable outcomes 

 

THRESHOLDS – unacceptable conditions we are trying to avoid 

Extended disruption to road access from Queenstown. 

Frequent or severe damaging or disruptive events. 

Loss of amenity and cultural values. 

Lengthy displacement of people following extreme events. 

Withdrawal of maintenance, decline in levels of service and increasing cost of repairs. 

Unaffordable or high-excess insurance premiums or withdrawal of insurance and bank finance. 

Other signals and triggers may be selected during implementation of the Strategy and development of operational plans. 

 

 

2  

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards) 

with input from Queenstown Lakes District Council 

and external support 

Periodic (at least every 5 years) 

 

Communication and reporting of physical environment monitoring  

Data collection and analysis findings will be communicated to key project partners and stakeholders.  

A brief environmental monitoring update report will be prepared every 3 years summarising any notable natural hazards event/impacts (e.g., peak flows/lake levels observed) within that time period, and any post-event data collection or analysis completed.  

One-off standalone event reports may be prepared for any natural hazards events which causes significant impact – summarising event causes, characteristics, effects/impacts, and ORC responses. 

Reports will be distributed to key contacts, through existing communication channels (e.g., ORC e-newsletter and project website), and appended to any councillor update reports. 

 

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards) 

 

3 yearly updates 

 

One-off reporting for significant events 

 

 

 

Emergency Management 

 

Status 

Action 

Goal this contributes towards 

Agency responsible 

Time frame 

New 

Develop a long-term recovery plan for a potential major hazard event, including ways to minimise maladaptation post-event and ensure recovery considers long-term adaptation opportunities. 

1, 3, 5  

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards) 

Civil Defense Emergency Management Otago 

Queenstown Lakes District Council 

Ongoing 

Existing 

Operate a network of near real-time rainfall and water level stations across the region to support flood forecasting and emergency response with a 24/7 duty roster to support forecasting duties and any necessary response. 

2, 3 

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards, Engineering, Environmental Monitoring) 

Civil Defense Emergency Management Otago 

Ongoing 

Existing 

Monitor and ensure ORC’s network of environmental monitoring stations remains fit for purpose, providing information for flood response, for documentation of flood events, and for public awareness of river flow, lake, and lagoon levels). 

Review of performance of the flood forecasting systems (lake level and lagoon level forecasting). 

Review of hydrological monitoring network (any opportunities for improvement?). 

New/temporary monitoring in some circumstances (e.g., landslide dam formation). 

This action is intended to ensure the monitoring network and forecasting systems provide the most suitable coverage. 

1, 2 

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards, Environmental Monitoring) 

Periodic reviews 

 

One-off temporary monitoring 

Existing 

Capability development and awareness raising  

Undertake public/internal education to develop knowledge and raise awareness of risks and natural hazards to communities and Community Response Group’s members. 

Share lessons learned from emergency response with communities. 

Introduced and organised training sessions for Community Response Group members on how to use Community Emergency Hub Guide. 

1, 2, 3 

Civil Defense Emergency Management Otago 

As needed 

Annually 

 

Existing 

Engagement with communities and stakeholders 

Communicate prior to forecast weather events to have a common understanding around Lake and Lagoon levels, river flows and potential outcomes of the forecast weather. 

Communicate with communities about changes in risk and readiness. 

Work with Community Response Group to coordinate emergency support before, during and after an emergency. 

Organised consultations with communities on emergency proposed plans and guidelines. 

Convene meetings with communities and stakeholders to decide a scale of an emergency event. 

1, 2, 3 

Civil Defense Emergency Management Otago  

Community Response Group 

 

As needed 

Annually 

Existing 

Risk communication and early warnings 

Provide right and trusted information about natural disasters to communities so that they can prepare effectively for emergency events. 

Civil Defense Emergency Management Otago  

Queenstown Lakes District Council 

Frequently 

Per event 

 

Existing 

Provide community resilience equipment  

Provide communications equipment to not only communicate locally but also communicate to the Emergency Operations Centre in Queenstown if BAU communications systems have failed. 

Provided equipment for communities to better prepare for emergency events: 

4000W Petrol Inverter Generator     

Petrol Container 

Extension cords 

Multi boxes 

Rechargeable LED light 20Watt Work-lights 

Tripod LED light 60Watt Work-lights 

Handheld torches and spare batteries. 

Queenstown Lakes District Council 

Civil Defense Emergency Management Otago 

As needed 

One-off 

 

 

Existing 

Develop and share emergency guides and plans and update annually 

Glenorchy Community Resilience Guide (draft in progress). 

Glenorchy Community Response Plan (draft in progress). 

Developed Glenorchy Flood Guide.  

Developed Community Emergency Hub Guide. 

Developed Community Emergency Preparedness Brochure. 

Civil Defense Emergency Management Otago 

Community Response Group 

Update annually 

Existing  

Training and exercises for Community Response Group and Emergency Hub implementation 

Provided training to help Community Response Group set up Emergency hubs, operate radios, and for community response planning. 

Exercise the implementation of the Community Emergency Hub to gain an understanding of expectations of the community, emergency services and local government as well as clarify any ambiguity or operational expectations that may present during an actual emergency. 

Civil Defense Emergency Management Otago 

Community Response Group 

 

One-off 

As needed 

 

 Advice, information, and education 

 

Status 

Action 

Goal this contributes towards 

Agency responsible 

Time frame 

Underway or planned 

Ensure the ORC Natural Hazards Portal includes up-to-date information on natural hazards and the impacts of climate change, to provide the community with a single location for information. 

2, 3  

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards) 

 

Underway or planned 

Maintain ORC Head of Lake Whakatipu adaptation webpages with relevant and up-to-date information, including latest reports, Council updates and key programme milestones.  

2 

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards and Communications) 

Ongoing 

Underway or planned 

Provide newsletter updates about programme milestones and/or progress towards actions to inform community members and be accountable to the Strategy. 

2 

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards and Communications) 

As needed 

New 

ORC to attend Glenorchy Community Association (GCA) meetings as and when required, at least annually, to provide updates about programme milestones and progress towards actions and act as a check-in with the community.  

2, 3 

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards) 

Annually or as needed 

Underway or planned 

Ensure that ORC’s messaging about natural hazards adaptation and adaptation workstreams is communicated in a way that is understood by a wide audience. 

2 

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards and Communications) 

Ongoing 

Underway or planned 

Monitor the headofthelake@orc.govt.nz inbox for public enquiries and information relating to the programme. Consider other methods and tools for capturing community feedback. 

2 

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards) 

Ongoing 

Policy and planning processes 

 

Status 

Action 

Goal this contributes towards 

Agency responsible 

Time frame 

Underway 

Consider natural hazard property information for resource and building consents. 

4 

Queenstown Lakes District Council 

Ongoing (BAU) 

Underway or planned 

ORC and QLDC to collaborate to ensure common adaptation priorities, information and actions identified in this Strategy inform and input into the next ORC and QLDC Long-Term Plan, Spatial Plan, District Plan and other relevant policies and plans. 

1, 2 

Otago Regional Council  

Queenstown Lakes District Council 

Every LTP cycle 

 

Natural hazard information is included on LIM reports. 

1, 2 

Queenstown Lakes District Council 

 

New 

ORC and QLDC to collaborate on path forward for assessing risk tolerance with the community (once the proposed RPS is operative). 

1, 2, 3, 4 

Otago Regional Council  

Queenstown Lakes District Council 

once the proposed RPS is operative 

Addressing impacts of natural hazards and climate change 

 

Status 

Action 

Goal this contributes towards 

Agency responsible 

Time frame 

Underway 

Routine maintenance of transport network, including QLDC roading assets, Glenorchy jetty and marina. 

1, 4 

Queenstown Lakes District Council 

Ongoing/BAU 

Underway 

Glenorchy Area Bridge Resilience (24-34 LTP): 

Non-routine work required to protect the serviceability of the Glenorchy, Paradise, Rees River bridge assets following damage, and to minimise threat of road closure due to natural phenomena. 

1, 4 

Queenstown Lakes District Council 

As required, budgeted biennially 

Underway 

Raising Kinloch Road (24-34 LTP) 

Raising Kinloch Road in conjunction with two-yearly gravel extraction under the Rees River bridge. 

1, 4 

Queenstown Lakes District Council 

As required, budgeted biennially 

New 

Develop Operational River Management Plans, including the Dart and Rees floodplains.  

  • Operational Management Plans that outline the activities undertaken for river management. 

  • These plans will be developed in 2025. 

1, 4 

Otago Regional Council (Engineering and Natural Hazards) 

  

2025 

Reviewed every 2 years  

New 

Develop a gravel management plan for the Buckler Burn 

  • ORC, Engineering held consent of Buckler gravel management plan. 

  • This plan will be developed in 2025.  

1, 4 

Otago Regional Council (Engineering and Natural Hazards) 

 

2025 

Reviewed every 2 years   

Underway 

Annual vegetation management, rock armouring and gravel management 

  • Ongoing river management activities (such as regular vegetation control in Lagoon Creek/Lagoon area). 

3, 4, 5 

Otago Regional Council (Engineering) 

 

Ongoing/Annually 

Existing 

Maintenance of Rees River floodbanks 

  • Maintain (not renew or increase) the existing banks – (Rees River floodbanks are not owned by ORC). 

1, 4 

Otago Regional Council (Engineering and Natural Hazards) 

Every 1 year 

New 

Floodplain and rivers 

  • Create/trial NBS groynes. 

1, 4, 5 

Otago Regional Council (Engineering and Natural Hazards) 

Every 2 years 

New  

Glenorchy Adaptation Pathways (30 Yr Infrastructure strategy) 

Work on Social Infrastructure required to address selected adaptation pathways, as budgeted in the QLDC 30-year Infrastructure Strategy. 

1, 3, 4 

Queenstown Lakes District Council 

2034-2054 

New 

Provide information and support property owners to undertake property-level interventions to improve their resilience to natural hazards risks. 

3, 4  

Otago Regional Council (Natural Hazards) 

 

New 

Head of the Lake Adaptation (24-34 LTP) 

Strategy to inform responses to identified hazards, providing scoped and costed solutions for input to the next LTP (27-37) and other key planning documents. 

1, 2, 4 

Queenstown Lakes District Council 

2034-2054 

Progress updates

(new updates will be presented here)