"Te mauri o te rangi, te mauri o te whenua, te mauri ora o Tara"
(When the lake, waterways and wildlife flourish, the people flourish)

We're very fortunate to have access to clean drinking water and there's an incredible amount of mahi (work) that goes into making sure it's available when you turn on the tap.

Early morning on Wednesday 13 December, I had the privilege of speaking on behalf of the Howick Local Board at the pre-dawn karakia (blessing) of the new Watercare reservoir at Redoubt Road. We'd seen the construction of this massive new asset throughout the year and it was great to be present for the final stages before it's commissioned - seeing water flow into the giant concrete cathedral that we recently visited was an amazing sight. In my speech I expressed our gratitude to all the people have had contributed to it's design and construction.

This third reservoir at this complex adds another 45 million litres of storage capacity, bringing the total to 165 million! This site handles about 80% of Auckland's daily water supply and this addition will future proof it to cope with our growing population while providing additional resilience to the network.

You can learn more about the project, including a time-lapse of the construction here.

You can read more about our visit in February here and our return visit in October here.