Open mike 31/12/2023

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, December 31st, 2023 - 38 comments
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38 comments on “Open mike 31/12/2023 ”

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  1. bwaghorn 1
    31 December 2023 at 6:49 am

    https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2023/12/nicola-willis-says-councils-responsible-for-sewerage-management-as-most-auckland-beaches-unsafe-to-swim-on-27c-day.html

    willis getting caught being a dishonest hypocrite, all labpurs fault when in opposition ,all the council at fault now she's in power, kick her to touch nz.

    • Tricledrown 1.1
      31 December 2023 at 5:52 pm

      3 waters replaced with rhetoric doing nothing but blaming others.Auckland is in massive trouble being the biggest contributor to the NZ economy Robertson and Hipkins could make good inroads into Nationals big surge last election .

      Infrastructure in NZ needs a huge investment in water sewage and transport schools hospitals etc National will apply their austerity of the sinking lid and propaganda. Kicking the can down the road as in the Cook straight ferry's and building roads for votes. But they are heading for a massive let down the promise of inflationary causing tax cuts is all National can do.

  2. Patricia Bremner 2
    31 December 2023 at 9:02 am

    Heartfelt wishes for Health and safety during 2024. smiley

  3. Adrian 3
    31 December 2023 at 9:21 am

    Exactly what are the risks? How many parts per billion? I suspect the paranoia is fueled by technology that can detect infintesimal fractions of pathogens, pathogens that we humans have been associated with for tens of thousands of years. The only water we had to swim in before this incursion of forensic tech were generally rivers that drained huge swathes of farmland and bush which was almost certainly tainted to a greater or lesser degree. I cannot recall many if any gutsaches associated with a good refreshing swim on a hot day. I also suspect that this drive to live in a completely antiseptic world may be our ultimate undoing.

    • Cricklewood 3.1
      31 December 2023 at 9:33 am

      I went for a swim anyways so did plenty of others. Defintly think they are over cautious for a lot of the beaches.

      Thats said there are plenty of spots where I wouldn't at pretty much no matter what swimsafe said knowing how bad and regular (if it rains it overflows) the sewage overflows are in the Henderson creek and entering the harbour at Te Atatu.

    • weka 3.2
      31 December 2023 at 9:44 am

      I think this is part of it, also the fall out from the Hastings debacle where thousands of people got sick from contaminated water and then a couple of councils sued each other or something.

      But, we are polluting water to a much greater extent than we used to. Farming has intensified in the past 2 decades, more ecological systems have been fucked with or destroyed, and there are more people. Not maintaining infrastructure is another issue. It all compounds.

      When Southland rivers started to reach pathological levels of contamination, the first place it turned up was in medical practices, where GPs noticed an upswing in children presenting with gastro illnesses. By the time water gets that polluted, it's very hard to address, not because we can't but because that waterway and community are so entrenched in destructive patterns.

      I don't know what's happening in Auckland, but there is a beach in Dunedin that's always had warnings about sewerage issues, because the city pumps (or used to) its sewerage out to sea. Probably a reasonable thing originally given the size of the city, but eventually it wasn't.

      Add to that climate change and increased rainfall pressures on everything. We're starting to see the hard end of our failures to respect nature.

      • Robert Guyton 3.2.1
        31 December 2023 at 9:51 am

        Earth-closets are better than water-closets!

        • weka 3.2.1.1
          31 December 2023 at 10:00 am

          I was thinking this exact same thing!

          Then imagining a city like Auckland converting. The block is imagination, philosophy and education, not technical.

          • Visubversa 3.2.1.1.1
            31 December 2023 at 10:42 am

            Cities had them up to almost Victorian times. The main solid waste removed from domestic dwellings was solid human waste and ash from domestic fires. The human waste was dug out of backyard earth closets – mixed with ash in the street, and the whole lot was raked up and collected at street corners to be removed by horse and cart to the countryside and used as fertiliser. Worked on a small scale, but not on a large scale.

            In bigger cities, human waste and other disposables were chucked into the rivers. In London, the "Great Stink" of the summer of 1858 (and the proximity of the Houses of Parliament to the Thames) forced action and the construction of the "Embankment" which provided interceptor drains which diverted small watercourses and drains further East for processing and then discharge closer to the sea.

      • Belladonna 3.2.2
        31 December 2023 at 10:16 am

        Auckland's problem is sewerage overflow after heavy rain. It's always (well, in my lifetime, and I'm sure before) been the case.

        There is cross-linkage between the stormwater and the sewerage systems – especially in older areas which didn't have the separation built in.

        They've just build a huge new sewer pipeline to try to deal with this in the high-priced Ponsonby area. NB: I think this should have been paid for by a targeted rate.

        https://www.mcconnelldowell.com/projects/st-marys-bay

        But there is also the issue of all of the 'stuff' from the streets (oil, dog poo, etc) being washed into the stormwater system after heavy rain. And this will always the the case. Swimming immediately after a downpour in a city is always at your own risk.

        Growing up, we swam at an inner-harbour mudflat 'beach' – which had waste-water outlets and occasional sewerage overflows filtered through the bush and mangroves. You just didn't swim next to the outlets, and didn't put your head under after heavy rain.

        Slight aside: Have a friend who's just had a large chunk of basal cell carcinoma removed. The oncologist was perfectly fine with her swimming in the sea (even with the odd health warning) – but was adamant that she shouldn't swim at the pools – a much greater degree of 'contamination' is present.

        • Visubversa 3.2.2.1
          31 December 2023 at 10:47 am

          My street in Auckland was subdivided in 1905. My house originally had a "night cart" collection.

          In 2005, the "Clear Harbour Alliance" separated the waste water and stormwater in our area to reduce pollution of the Meola catchment. I got a new wastewater connection, and the stormwater continued to be disposed by way of a sump which drains to the culverted and covered stream at the bottom of the street.

        • weka 3.2.2.2
          31 December 2023 at 11:11 am

          lol that last paragraph.

          heavy rain and overflow is the end point issue, but underlying that is really bad design and philosophy around human waste. If one believes that there is a magical time/place where we will have the infrastructure and technology to manage increasing quantities of poo and pee (not to mention everything else that goes into sewerage), then we end up with systems like this that don't function within the limits of nature and generally don't respect nature as a consequence.

          Climate change will increase the problem exponentially in compounding ways.

          Many small villages in NZ have emptied sewerage into water ways. It works when populations are small and sparse. Once a certain population grows and becomes more dense, the systems simple stop working safely and well. We're at the limits of growth.

          • Robert Guyton 3.2.2.2.1
            31 December 2023 at 11:22 am

            " It works when populations are small and sparse. "

            I beg to differ and I understand that manawhenua do also 🙂

            • weka 3.2.2.2.1.1
              31 December 2023 at 11:25 am

              Fair point, let me rephrase. It worked for Pākehā for quite some time in that they didn't get sick from their own shit 😉 The system can't be scaled up because it is inherently disrespectful of nature.

              • Robert Guyton …
                31 December 2023 at 2:11 pm

                If you accept the indigenous view, Pakehā did get sick from their own shit.

                They just didn't recognise their illness.

          • Cricklewood 3.2.2.2.2
            31 December 2023 at 11:32 am

            In plenty of places in Aucjland its not heavy rain but any rain. With the massive population growth and new devlopments all plumbed into the existing infrastructure it fails almost daily in a couple of places. Basically on an out of sight out of mind basis. Hence the sad situation in Henderson creek / Te Wai o Pareira which is roundly ignored although thats slowly changing given the work of https://www.rivercaregroup.org/

            A local communty group at its best imo everyone interested in their local waterways should take a look.

            • Belladonna 3.2.2.2.2.1
              31 December 2023 at 1:06 pm

              Not to mention the infill townhouse developments with full-site coverage (either from buildings or driveways) – removing any ability for the land to sponge up rainfall.

            • Visubversa 3.2.2.2.2.2
              31 December 2023 at 3:45 pm

              Absolutely. The old North Shore City Council used to require that any development which increased the amount of impervious area in the areas closer to the coastline, had to install detention/retention tanks to take the first flush of stormwater. These could be plumbed in to provide non-potable water for things like flushing toilets, watering gardens and providing the first rinse in a washing machine.

              The tanks could be installed under a concrete driveway, or tucked under the eaves of a dwelling. One company even provided under eave tanks which mimicked the appearance of weatherboarding in historical areas.

              I don't think this was carried into the Unitary Plan.

              • Cricklewood …
                31 December 2023 at 7:24 pm

                Its there, pretty much everybuild I work behind as a landscaper has retention tanks and there are rules about pemable space and some pretty cool permable paving products about now. Stoneset and Hydopave are good examples

          • Adrian 3.2.2.2.3
            31 December 2023 at 1:01 pm

            And the fish were bigger!

      • Anne 3.2.3
        31 December 2023 at 10:32 am

        "Add to that climate change and increased rainfall pressures on everything. We're starting to see the hard end of our failures to respect nature."

        The sum of the difference between now and past years.

        Add to that, the increased pressures on sewerage systems and related infrastructure in a rapidly growing population is going to require both financial and structural co-operation between councils and government. This is especially true of Auckland.

        Madam Willis' comment does not auger well.

        Councils are not entirely responsible for the situation. Past governments have to take some of the blame for their lack of over-all jurisdiction covering decades. For her to dismiss it as… "nothing to do with government"… is typical right-wing bull headedness and lack of comprehension about what is at stake.

        She is a dunderhead.

    • UncookedSelachimorpha 3.3
      31 December 2023 at 12:14 pm

      In a former working life I used to have to know quite a bit about this.

      The standards are based on a likelihood of making you sick, and as such have tangible meaning. There is a direct correlation between what is measured and the chance of a person becoming ill from swimming there. The unacceptable risk is quite low (e.g. you might only have a 5% chance of getting ill), but the risk is worse for immunocompromised people.

      https://environment.govt.nz/publications/microbiological-water-quality-guidelines-for-marine-and-freshwater-recreational-areas/part-iii-explanatory-notes-to-the-guidelines/#note-g-x

      Events with lowish probability are particularly likely to induce the anecdotal fallacy

      “The anecdotal fallacy occurs when people use their limited personal experience to make sweeping conclusions about a given topic. It is an exceedingly common fallacy to commit, and nearly everyone has done it at one point or another.”

  4. joe90 4
    31 December 2023 at 11:53 am

    Cathedral, mountain, moon.

    Taken in Piemonte, Italy, the cathedral in the foreground is the Basilica of Superga, the mountain in the middle is Monviso, and, well, you know which moon is in the background.

    https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap231225.html

  5. Sanctuary 5
    31 December 2023 at 5:41 pm

    Here is a list of NZ's top YouTube content creators. They got millions of followers and above all, are GROWING when legacy media are shedding jobs and seems to be in terminal decline.

    Yet legacy media is utterly indifferent to their obvious appeal. Why is that?

    https://voyager.nz/blog/the-top-new-zealand-youtubers

    • weka 5.1
      31 December 2023 at 6:20 pm

      people want to watch gamer and makeup YT rather than legacy media? Not sure what legacy media is supposed to take from that.

      The only one I know is the tiny home dude, and his videos are excellent. The dude who goes to war torn countries and focuses on the good things looks interesting.

      Is the class system fail vid about history or gaming? You see the problem?

      • Sanctuary 5.1.1
        1 January 2024 at 12:16 am

        I am currently on holiday so internet search skills are a bit limited.

        The point isn't the content, it's that these people are growing an audience when legacy media numbers are falling despite a race to the bottom. These people are doing something right, yet the MSM pretends the audience they serve doesn't exist and the skills they have might not point to a different way of delivering content. Instead, it is a circle jerk of increasingly hubristic failure. 3news failing? No problem, they all get a job at TVNZ. TVNZ job cuts? They all fail over to commercial radio. All get sacked there? Back to TV or newspapers! RNZ struggling with a falling audience for news? They hire some proven dud from mediaworks to turn things around by doing more of the same. Not one of the top 20-30 youthful online content creators has been picked up by broadcast media, who prefer an increasingly rictus Simon or mummified Wendy and to continue to pretend they are the primary source of news and set the narrative, when really they are sliding to irrelevance because Topham Guerin has hired all the internet savvy kids.

        • weka 5.1.1.1
          1 January 2024 at 12:06 pm

          yeah, not a lot to disagree with there. It's the same across society really. The people with the power are largely the people who lack the imagination to see how to do things differently (not everyone, there are people in MSM who get it but don't have the power to make the changes).

          I don't have a TV or newspaper subs, so I rely on social media connections, google/archive, and listening to RNZ haphazardly to know what is going on. I then go and read/listen to/watch the MSM selectively. TVNZ and TV3 both seem stuck in pre-2010 internet with their online services. My take on that is they are more interested in clicks than people using their service well and I'm just not someone who is captured by clicks, so it doesn't work. Also autoplay and flashing ads on websites will often make me close the page.

          Younger people will be less bothered by that, because for them it will be the norm. But it's still got fuck all to do with technology and everything to do with purpose and lack of imagination.

      • Incognito 5.2.1
        31 December 2023 at 8:01 pm

        That’s likely because Sanctuary’s linked article was from more than three years ago, i.e., from the internet archives.

    • Incognito 5.3
      31 December 2023 at 8:26 pm

      I don’t know what you consider NZ legacy media but I do think that NZ media are well aware of the many issues that are affecting them and that they deserve a little more credit.

      https://newsroom.co.nz/2023/12/29/he-had-the-receipts-media-person-of-the-year/

      YT is no substitute for professionally operated news media organisations.

      My impression is that the indiscriminate use of YT clips here on TS has waned a wee bit. Yet, at the same time, some here complain about some Posts being too long, whilst others have no qualms dumping very long YT videos here under the pretence of making an independent original comment here.

  6. joe90 6
    31 December 2023 at 9:41 pm

    Little wonder they're limiting press access to Gaza.

    //

    The intensity of bombing in Gaza is something the researchers said they've never seen before.

    "It's just the sheer speed of the damage," said Van Den Hoek. "All of these other conflicts that we're talking about [Ukraine, Syria, Yemen] are years long. This is a little over two months. And the sheer tempo of the bombing — not just the scale of it but the sheer tempo — there's nothing that tracks [like] this in such a short timeframe."

    .

    […]

    The Financial Times did a statistical analysis that compared Gaza to the Allied bombing campaign over Germany during the Second World War.

    Three cities in Germany were effectively destroyed from the air during that war: Cologne, Hamburg and Dresden. In Hamburg and Dresden, a mix of high explosives and incendiary bombs created the notorious "firestorm" conditions that caused streets to melt.

    Data analyzed by Scher and Van Den Hoek shows that by Dec. 5, the percentage of Gaza's buildings that had been damaged or destroyed already had surpassed the destruction in Cologne and Dresden, and was approaching the level of Hamburg.

    Israel Defence Forces (IDF) dropped around 1,000 bombs a day in the first week of the campaign and said that it had conducted more than 10,000 airstrikes on Gaza as of Dec. 10. The number of aircraft involved or bombs dropped on each mission is unknown, but Israel's main strike aircraft are capable of carrying six tons of bombs each.

    For context, London was hit with an estimated 19,000 tons of bombs during the eight months of the Blitz, and the atomic bomb that destroyed Hiroshima was equivalent to 15,000 tons of high explosive.

    The figures for airstrikes do not take into account the many thousands of artillery shells fired into Gaza since Oct. 7

    https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/israel-gaza-bombing-hamas-civilian-casualties-1.7068647

  8. Eco Maori 8
    1 January 2024 at 4:56 pm

    Leave my wife alone you muppets