Pinehaven Stream Improvements Archaeological Assessment of Pinehaven Stream Floodplain Management
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Pinehaven Stream Improvements Archaeological assessment of Pinehaven Stream Floodplain Management July 2017 Archaeological assessment of Pinehaven Stream Floodplain Management for Jacobs Ltd Kevin L. Jones Kevin L. Jones Archaeologist Ltd 6/13 Leeds Street WELLINGTON 6011 [email protected] Wellington 15 July 2017 Caption frontispiece: Pinehaven c. 1969 viewed from the north. Trentham camp mid-left, St Patricks (Silverstream) College at right. Pinehaven Stream runs across the centre of the photograph. Source: Hutt City Library. 2 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY This assessment reviews the risk of there being archaeological sites as defined in the Heritage NZ Pouhere Taonga Act 2014 in the vicinity of the works proposed for the Pinehaven Stream. The geomorphology of the area has been reviewed to determine whether there are older land surfaces that would have been suitable for pre-European or 19th C settlement. Remnant forest trees indicate several areas of older but low-lying (flood-prone) surfaces but field inspections indicate no archaeological sites. A review of earlier (1943) aerial photographs and 19th C survey plans indicate no reasonable cause to suspect that there will be archaeological sites. A settlement established in 1837 by Te Kaeaea of Ngati Tama in the general area of St Patricks College Silverstream is more or less on the outwash plain of the Pinehaven Stream. The fan north of the college is heavily cut into by the edge of the Hutt valley flood plain. This is the only historically documented 19th C Maori settlement on the Pinehaven Stream fan but it is outside the area of proposed works. Another broad class of archaeological site may be earlier forms of infrastructure on the stream such as dams, mills, races, bridges, abutments, and logging and rail infrastructure. No such infrastructure works of sufficient age to be classified as archaeological sites have been identified in the Pinehaven Floodplain Management area. Overall there is no reasonable cause to suspect that archaeological sites will appear in the areas proposed for works for the Pinehaven Stream Floodplain Management Project. There is therefore no need to apply for an authority under the relevant provisions of the Heritage NZ Pouhere Taonga Act 2014. INTRODUCTION This archaeological assessment has been commissioned by Jacobs New Zealand Limited, consultants to the Greater Wellington Regional Council. The site area is the immediate environs of the lower to middle course of the Pinehaven Stream to the intersection of Dowling Grove and Whitemans Valley Road where the steam is fully culverted and eventually passes under the main commercial area of Pinehaven, a suburb of Upper Hutt (Fig. 1). The area has bene subjected to surface flooding on several occasions. 3 The grid reference is NZTM E1771630 N5474331. The street address is much of the length of Whitemans Valley Road and the north-western section of Blue Mountains Road. Legal description is mainly stream and road reserve with minor areas of numerous private properties. This report is an archaeological assessment to advise whether an authority or authorities are needed under the Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga Act 2014. This assessment does not cover Maori values or wahi tapu. Setting (Figs 1, 2) The site area is the valley floor and lower valley flood plain of the Pinehaven Stream and its various tributaries east of the main shopping area. The works proposed are improved channelling, culverting and bridging of the stream and narrowly focused on the course of the stream and its tributaries. The problem areas do not extend out on to the main flood plain of the Hutt River. Statutory definitions and protection of archaeological sites There are two main pieces of legislation in New Zealand that control work affecting archaeological sites. These are the Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga Act 2014 (HNZPTA) and the Resource Management Act 1991 (RMA). Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga administers the HNZPTA. The HNZPTA contains a consent (authority) process for any work affecting archaeological sites, where an archaeological site is defined in s. 6 as: subject to section 42(3),— (a) any place in New Zealand, including any building or structure (or part of a building or structure), that— (i) was associated with human activity that occurred before 1900 or is the site of the wreck of any vessel where the wreck occurred before 1900; and (ii ) provides or may provide, through investigation by archaeological methods, evidence relating to the history of New Zealand; and (b) includes a site for which a declaration is made under section 43(1) 4 Under s. 42, Archaeological sites not to be modified or destroyed. (1) Unless an authority is granted under section 48, 56(1)(b), or 62 in respect of an archaeological site, no person may modify or destroy, or cause to be modified or destroyed, the whole or any part of that site if that person knows, or ought reasonably to have suspected, that the site is an archaeological site. In addition, any person who intends carrying out work that may damage, modify or destroy an archaeological site, or to investigate a site using invasive archaeological techniques, must first obtain an authority from Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga. The process applies to sites on land of all tenure including public, private and designated land. The HNZPTA contains penalties for unauthorised site damage or destruction including criminal offences. Authority means an authority granted by Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga under sections 48, 56, or 62 to undertake an activity that will or may modify or destroy 1 or more archaeological sites. There are three types of authority: • To undertake an activity that will destroy or modify sites within a specified area of land • Similar to above except that the effects on sites will be no more than minor as set out in s. 47 (5) • To undertake a scientific investigation. S. 47 (5) (the minor effects clause) states that in the case of an application made under section 44(b), without limiting the matters that Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga may have regard to for the purpose of determining whether an application meets the requirements of subsection (1)(a)(ii) of this section, it must have regard to— (a) the significance of a site or sites in relation to evidence of the historical and cultural heritage of New Zealand; and (b) the extent to which the proposed activity will modify or destroy the site or sites. HNZPT may return an application for an authority that is deficient in documentation. The archaeological authority process applies to all sites that fit the HNZTPA 2014 definition, regardless of whether: • The site is recorded in the NZ Archaeological Association Archsite (on-line Site Recording Scheme) or registered by the Trust, • The site only becomes known about as a result of ground disturbance, and/ or 5 • The activity is permitted under a district or regional plan, or a resource or building consent has been granted. Heritage places under consideration This assessment covers the possibility pre-European archaeological sites on the Pinehaven stream fan where it has formed at the margin of the Hutt Valley floor, and the possibility that there may be surviving areas of bridge structures and base course of the old Whitemans Valley Road (surveyed by 1877, formed probably in the 1880s). METHODOLOGY This assessment involves both desktop research and field inspection of the main engineering sites proposed on the Pinehaven Stream. Geomorphology of the Pinehaven valley and likelihood of early settlement In general, a stream like the Pinehaven will have an outwash plain or fan where it debouches on to the main river terraces of the Hutt River. The soils here may have very old surfaces that have been flood-free for centuries. Although no such soils have been mapped for this area, it is this type of soil surface where pre-European and 19th C archaeological sites are most likely to have been. There are also likely to be soils that will have formed on slowly accumulating sediments with a steady formation of topsoil, over time forming very deep topsoils. Elsewhere in the North Island such soils were attractive for pre-European Maori settlement. However, in Wellington, where pre-European population density was low, the risk of pre-European settlement this far inland is low. Early survey plans The early SOs (survey office plans) show the following: Hutt Sections (89 and 102 - collectively known as Mauihakona), were purchased by the New Zealand Government c. 1860 for the Ngati Tama chief Te Kaeaea (also known as Wikitoa Turanga Kuri, or ‘Dog’s Ear’) (see Archsite R27/520 below). SO 11265 dated 1877 (Fig. 3) shows No. 1 Line on line of Whiteman Road (it is stopped today at the intersection of Whiteman and Chatsworth Roads). No subdivision is shown. Blue Mountain and Pinehaven Roads were originally called Whitemans Valley Road and the route surveyed by this time. 6 SO 17009 dated 1915 (Fig. 4) shows Trentham Military Reserve and several rifle ranges to the east of Pinehaven (where Rimutaka prison is today). There are subdivisions off No. 1 Line (now Whitemans Road and the eastern side of Blue Mountains Road. This is the earliest map of subdivision in the Pinehaven valley and indicates that all of the existing houses post-date 1915, unless there were older structures such as farmhouses on much larger blocks. If so, there is no cadastral record of them. Overall, the early survey plans show that there was little or no European settlement in the eastern Upper Hutt hills until the era of World War I. Aerial photographs (Figs 5, 6) I have reviewed aerial photograph (NZ Aerial Mapping RN 183/20 19 May 1943) with its stereo pair.