New Zealand Huts : Building blocks of the national hut system

New Zealand Huts Department of Conservation (DoC) System —

Part A: Six Building blocks of the national hut system

(Note: this is part of the larger work New Zealand Huts: Notes towards a Country Study)

Introduction

This is the first in a series of posts (Parts A – E) providing an overview of how the NZ Department of Conservation (DoC) operates New Zealand’s collectively owned system of 962 huts. The series includes:

Part A: Six Building Blocks of the DoC Hut System
Part B: How Many and What Kinds? A Tally and Taxonomy
Part C: Operational Costs and Revenues
Part D: Notes on Ten Selected Operations
Part E: Great Walks Huts

Part A looks at what I am calling ‘Six Building Blocks, i.e. six of the key DoC documents that laid the foundations for creating a cohesive national hut system for NZ, the world’s largest. DoC’s policies and operational methods are well documented online. The intent of this summary is to provide the reader a broad overview and links and pointers to more in-depth information.

First, a quick look at the NZ Department of Conservation as a whole.

Broad Overview of DoC

DoC is the NZ government agency which operates the largest hut system in the world. The agency was established under the Conservation Act 1987, which consolidated parts of several agencies, including the huts, tracks and other infrastructure for outdoor recreation, conservation and scientific work. Prior to 1987 the organization of NZ land management agencies was based on those in the U.S., i.e. separate agencies for various types of federal lands. The 1987 Conservation Act moved to consolidate many functions in one agency with a clear conservation mandate driving all land management policies and programs, and in the hope of better coordination among formerly distinct agencies with overlapping missions. See Historical Perspectives for historical context on the development of DoC.

Operating under the Minister of Conservation, DoC is responsible for stewardship of New Zealand’s land deemed to have “high conservation value”. This covers over eight million hectares, about 1/3 of the nation’s land, which includes 14 National Parks; many forest, conservation and farm parks, Conservation Parks/Areas, marine reserves, several thousand scenic reserves, three World Heritage Areas, and 11 designated wilderness areas. These lands, which include many of the country’s major tourist attractions, are often referred to collectively as the “conservation estate”. In addition to Parks and Recreation and “visitor management”, –the rubrics for huts and tracks — DoC is deeply involved in heritage preservation; protection and restoration of indigenous flora, fauna and habitats; eradication of predators and invasive species; managing threats to the environment; mapping, monitoring and data collection; and research and development.

[To me as a visitor, DoC efforts at predator eradication and restoration of native species, and educational/interpretive initiatives around these programs, appeared particularly ambitious and robust. And the extent of DoC land holdings, parks, trail heads, campgrounds, etc. was made startlingly obvious in the form of the omnipresent green and yellow signage everywhere one goes.]

Key sources of legislative authority and defined roles for this broad conservation portfolio are based in acts such as (a partial listing): Conservation Act of 1987, Freedom Camping Act 2011, Marine Mammals Protection Act 1978, Marine and Coastal Areas Act 2011, Marine Reserve Act 1971, National Parks Act 1980, Reserves Act 1977, Wild Animal Control Act 1977, Wildlife Act 1953, Biosecurity Act 1993, Fisheries Act 1996, Resource Management Act 1991, The New Zealand Walkways Act, and others.

For detail on DoC budget, priorities and operations see Department of Conservation Annual Report for year Ending 30 June 2017.

Operating a National System of Huts and Tracks: principles, strategies and standards

Broadly, management of recreational infrastructure and programs is by districts, with 18 offices and 13 visitor centers on the South Island, and 25 offices and 6 visitor centers on the North Island. The district offices manage lands and the range of DoC programs in the district, and the visitor centres are the public-facing information centers. Conveniently, DoC Visitor Centres are often co-located with i-SITE Centres, the network of over 80 information centers operated by Tourism New Zealand.

DoC Visitor Center Fijordland National Park

The DoC recreational infrastructure includes 962 huts and nearly 15,000 km of tracks. Each of the 43 DoC districts is responsible for hut and track operations and maintenance within its area. Across the districts these activities are conducted in accordance with a remarkably well-developed set of principles, service standards, standard operating procedures, and hut and track design standards.

However, before delving into the standards, it is important to note that this national operational framework, the topic of this section, is complemented by a certain degree of local autonomy in each district. This appears to be a strength of the system that allows some decisions and priorities to be adjusted according to local terrain, traditions, experience and interests. While I don’t know the degree of local autonomy allowed within the mandate of meeting national standards, I noticed some inspiring instances.

I was particularly taken by the Takkaka District which has (in keeping with the fee-spirited regional character of Golden Bay) a history of creative and resourceful hut development and restoration. For example, legendary NZFS Ranger Max Polglaze developed on his own initiative two fabulous dry rock shelters, Upper Gridiron Hut (1980) and Lower Gridiron Rock Shelter (1978). More recently, DoC Takkaka, in particular Ranger John Taylor, the mentee of Polglaze, advocated and worked with the NZ Deerstalkers to complete the amazing restorations of the Tent Camp and Chaffey Hut. These few examples are national treasures that simply wouldn’t exist absent a healthy measure of local initiative and autonomy. It appears to me that local initiative serves as a helpful counterpoint to uniform policies and standards. These efforts — often the result of a small number of persistent individuals — engender creative energy in ensuring the national hut system doesn’t take on a wholly “cookie-cutter” look and feel, and they act as essential sparks of innovation within a bureaucracy that can teeter towards lumbering uniformity.

Following are some relevant highlights of 6 key national-level operational documents, along with links to the documents themselves. These are foundational documents in DoC’s work to develop a coherent national approach to management of the conservation estate, in particular in relation to huts and tracks. Collectively, the standards, guidelines and operating procedures contained in these documents are designed to ensure safety, operational efficiency, and cost-effectiveness across a system of 962 huts and nearly 15,000 km of tracks, over 14,000 thousand bridges and boardwalks, thousands of toilets, over 2,000 km of roads, and hundreds of campgrounds and picnic areas. These key documents were developed to help forge a coherent national system of huts and tracks out of a sprawling, uncoordinated collection of infrastructure DoC inherited in 1987. Not an easy task and not without controversy.

In any case these are the most detailed and thoughtful hut operations guidelines I have ever encountered.

“Hut Principles: Selecting a Sustainable Core Network of Huts”

This 3-page document was developed in the 1990’s as part of DoC’s efforts to review its recreational infrastructure to determine the right mix of visitor facilities for New Zealanders. This is one of several documents that informed DoC’s extensive Recreational Opportunity Review in the early 2000’s. The core hut principles are quoted below. In addition, this four-page document:

delineates travel times (vs. distance) to huts as a primary means of communicating the level of challenge, with huts spaced 3-4 hours used for less experienced users, and 6-8 hours for more experienced visitors at remote sites.
Defines criteria for determining which huts would be retained and which might not be retained.

SELECTION FROM CORE HUT PRINCIPLES:

Huts are an important part of the backcountry experience and many are significant in their own right

Overnight accommodation is provided to enhance the backcountry experience by providing safe dry shelter suitable for sleeping at a variety of locations.
Day visitors do not require overnight accommodation, although they may require shelter
Huts must all meet the following minimum service standard requirements;
- weatherproof
- in a reasonable state of repair
- not dangerous
- not insanitary

The objective is to retain the existing range of opportunities of which huts are often an integral part.
There should be neither too many nor too few huts, to be determined through the use of these Principles and conservancy strategic objectives.
Huts will range in size to cater for and in some cases to manage the variety of levels of use.
The choice of the appropriate mix will be made following public consultation and will take account of the concept of providing a range of recreation opportunities including suitable travel times for primary visitor groups.
Where a hut is deemed to not be part of the core hut network, but there is an individual, a community group or club prepared to commit the time and resources required, then an agreement can be established between the individual, group or club and the department to hand over management responsibility.

“Visitor Strategy”

This 60-page document was developed in 1996 in the wake of the Cave Creek Tragedy to help DoC balance its responsibility to foster opportunities for visitors to visit and learn from public lands without compromising its conservation mission and visitor safety. A key outcome of this report in relation to huts and tracks derived from its analysis and blending of previous work such as the ‘Recreational Opportunity Spectrum’ with an analysis of visitor groups to the conservation estate. This is summarized in the following extract and table from the ‘Visitor Strategy’.

Recreational Opportunity Spectrum and Visitor Groups:

The Conservation Management Strategy (CMS) or recreation/visitor strategy for each conservancy provides an assessment of the recreational opportunities managed by the department in that region. A recreational opportunity comprises a combination of an activity, a setting and an experience. The Recreational Opportunity Spectrum (ROS) describes and maps recreational opportunities and has been adopted nationally by the department. Using the ROS, opportunities for outdoor recreation experiences are classified along a continuum of areas from urban to wilderness.

Based on the ROS assessment of recreational opportunities, seven distinct visitor groups can be identified

Short Stop Travelers (SST)
Day Visitors (DV)
Overnighters (ON)
Backcountry Comfort Seekers (BCC)
Backcountry Adventurers (BCA)
Remoteness Seekers (RS)
Thrill Seekers (TS)

Although some visitors can belong to different groups at different times, at any one- time visitors will be in one of these seven groups. The seven visitor groups are derived from the eight ROS classes; their relationship is shown in Table 1. There is not a perfect correlation between the visitor groups and the ROS classes, as all visitor groups (except backcountry comfort seekers) tend to use more than one ROS class. Some examples of typical sites are also given in the table.

This broad national visitor strategy scheme was subsequently applied to huts and trails in the ‘Hut Service Standards’ described below.

‘Hut Service Standards’

Developed in 1999 and revised in 2003, the 44-page ‘Hut Services Standards’ is the core hut operations document. It defines three visitor groups for backcountry huts and four corresponding categories of huts. It then details service standards for each of the four categories, including categories such as hut siting, condition, size and design, sleeping facilities, cooking and heating, water supply, toilets, lighting, furniture, interpretation, signage, safety, furniture and drying facilities, visitor information, cleaning, and staffing. These detailed service standards are framed by two key elements:

1. Visitor Strategy: These have their origins in the national DoC ‘Visitor Strategy’ described above. Using quotations from the broader ‘Visitor Strategy’ document, the Visitor Strategy in ‘Hut Service Standards’ briefly defines three user groups:

Backcountry Comfort Seekers (BCC) – “the priority is….on providing them with safe facilities….and a degree of comfort in camping and hut facilities” “BCC [seek] a low risk, comfortable experience.” “Seek….daily track condition information from hut wardens.”
Backcountry Adventurers (BCA) – “….accept a degree of risk and discomfort”. “Require only basic facilities maintained to an appropriate standard
Remoteness Seekers (RS) – “Natural setting (remote…). Contains few or no facilities.”

2. Hut Categories: Based on the facilities and service requirements of the three visitor groups, DoC huts are sorted into four categories:

Great Walks Huts (catering for BCC) are the most comfortable. There are bunks or sleeping platforms with mattresses, toilets, a water supply, hand washing facilities, and heating with fuel available. They may have solar lighting, cooking facilities with fuel (but no utensils) and a hut ranger (warden) on site. Great Walks require booking. Maximum stay periods apply.
Serviced and Serviced Alpine Huts (catering for BCC or BCA) offer bunks or sleeping platforms with mattresses, a water supply, toilets and hand washing facilities, and heating with fuel (usually wood stove). Serviced Alpine Huts are found only in South Island alpine areas. They have higher fees to assist with the higher costs of maintaining these huts. These huts provide a base for mountaineering activities. A mountain radio is usually provided.
Standard Huts (catering for BCA) have bunks for sleeping platforms, mattresses, a toilet and a water supply. They may have heating. Note: wood heaters are present in huts at or below the bush line.
Basic Huts (catering for BCA or RS)

Note: none of the DoC operated huts provide food sales or service, bedding linens, cooking utensils, or showers.

For those interested in more in-depth detail on NZ hut operations, ‘Hut Services Standards’ is a must-read document. Rather than attempt to summarize the standards, the reader is directed to the table on p. 34-42 of ‘Hut Service Standards”. This summarizes service standards and level of amenities by hut category. See also my separate discussion of the level of hut amenities in NZ and my Tally and Taxonomy, which provides photographs of huts in each category.

Hut Inspection Standard Operating Procedure – VC 1583

This 109-page document outlines the requirements for regular inspection of all backcountry huts and associated toilets, warden quarters, woodsheds, dog kennels, etc. Last reviewed June 2016, it is a set of detailed procedures and criteria for regular inspections aimed at:

ensuring that the Hut Service Standards are being met, i.e. that the hut is safe and healthy environment;
identifying deficiencies and updating the information in DoC’s asset management database (AMIS); and
assessing natural hazards affecting hut sites, e.g. avalanche and slip damage and other geological hazards.

This is a remarkable resource for folks engaged in regular hut maintenance. Here are the key elements:

Construction of the AMIS (Asset Management Information System) database was begun in 1998 in the wake of the Cave Creek Tragedy as a means of tracking the safety and maintenance needs of backcountry huts and other DoC infrastructure. It may have been the first such system in the world for a conservation agency and has since been emulated in Australia and elsewhere. Essentially DoC places orange tags on all its physical assets (e.g. signs, buildings, bridges, etc.) with unique identifiers. AMIS is a database of these assets. It is updated regularly and used to produce management data tracking their condition and a history of maintenance performed. It is also used to generate prioritized reports on ongoing maintenance needs.

The Hut Inspection Standard Operating Procedure – VC 1583 details frequency, and roles and responsibilities for performing hut inspections and for entering data into AMIS database. Main types of inspection include:

Baseline inspection by engineer – a “one-off” inspection to determine the condition of the hut at the point of inheritance by DoC or completion of construction.
Ongoing inspection by DoC – regular inspection (annual for Great Walks huts, every two years for Sandard Huts, and every 4 years for Basic huts) by “inspectors” (trained DoC rangers) to check on compliance with service standards.
Re-inspection by Engineer – Every 6 years for Great Walks huts, serviced huts with sleeping capacity of > 25, and all other huts above 1100 m altitude.

The results of inspections are entered into AMIS and defects found are coded as critical, serious or routine. AMIS is used to generate prioritized work orders if and as necessary for routine or urgent remedy of deficiencies, and/or for further inspection by specialists (e.g. LPG specialists for issues with gas cookers or heaters, structural engineering or waste management concerns, or natural hazard concerns, or other concerns).

The heart of the document is the detailed lists of inspection criteria. Section 3.2, p. 35-40 lists the inspection categories, which include topics (each topics is broken into detailed subsets) such as: visitor impacts, waste management/sewerage, vegetation, foundations/subfloor/tiedowns, exterior claddings (including roof), water supply, flooring/decking, interior walls/roof/linings, interior fixtures/joinery, cooking, heating, LPG, hazardous substances, fire safety, electrical/lighting/radios, furniture/moveable items, visitor information, and natural hazards.

Section 3.7, p. 47-85, is a more detailed, component-by-component listing of what the inspector should look for in each category.

Rangers inspecting huts take along a set of tools and supplies to perform on-the-spot repairs. The section on “community owned and maintained” huts will likely be updated in light of the formation by DoC and its cooperators of the Back Country Trust in 2017.

Hut Procurement Manual

Building on the documents previously detailed, the Hut Procurement Manual provides extremely detailed process, design and construction specifications for backcountry huts (at least a half-days walk from road). This extensive document (8 parts comprising hundreds of pages) is to ensure compliance with the National Building Code and other relevant statutes relevant to buildings on DoC lands (these include the Conservation Act, National Parks Act, Reserves Act, NZ Walkways Act, and Marine Reserves Act).

It is worth noting that after struggling to work within the National Building Code, which was written without consideration of the unique purposes and nature of huts, DoC was allowed to write a separate “hut-related” section of the Building Code. These were legislatively incorporated (Building Amendment Regulations, 2008) into the National Building Code and have allowed DoC flexibility and introduced some common sense into the challenge of implementing the National Building Act of 1991 in relation to backcountry huts.

In this context it is also worth noting a key design principle governing DoC huts concerns visitor capabilities and expectations; the driving assumption in hut design is that:

In terms of the Visitor Strategy, these huts are provided for Backcountry Comfort Seekers, Backcountry Adventurers and Remoteness seekers. These users include trampers, climbers and hunters, be they New Zealanders or international visitors, of varying degrees of ability and experience. They are expected to reach these huts, or undertake activities from them, on foot, be within the 10 – 65 years age bracket, of reasonable fitness and with minimal disabilities. Users carry their own provisions and equipment with them, and are expected to be self-sufficient in carrying out their activities. They will normally stay one night before moving on.

Due to the lack of vehicular access, the remoteness, and the terrain in which these huts are located people with disabilities requiring wheelchair access to and within the huts are not expected to visit or use these huts. Therefore only those people with disabilities who retain a reasonable degree of mobility and agility can be expected to visit and use these huts.

[The above is quoted from Hut Procurement Manual VC1414, p. 5; note: bold italic print for several sentences were added by the author (Sam) to draw attention to some fundamental Kiwi principles concerning the level of amenities provided by huts].

In brief, the Hut Procurement Manual defines the mandatory process for procuring and constructing huts, including out buildings. The incredible detail provided in the overview and its 7 appendices covers topics such as: pre-process decision making, briefing decisions, information gathering, siting and site preparation, water and toilets, site visits, tender and building consent decisions, construction and construction observation, contract administration, detailed architectural drawings and specifications (e.g. specs for site work and foundations, steel framing, carpentry, roofing and cladding, exterior joinery, finishing and painting, and water supply).

This level of detail is only of interest to folks seriously engaged in planning to build huts; but for them it may be the most detailed and easily accessible architectural and construction detail available anywhere.

See below DoC links for downloading the eight components of the Hut Procurement Manual.

Please note: Some of the PDF’s are large as they contain plans and images. They may take some time to download.

Track Standards, VC1200; aka New Zealand Tracks and Outdoor Visitor Structures, (Standards New Zealand, HB 8630:2004)

This handbook covers standards for tracks (trails, in American parlance) and outdoor visitor structures for all NZ agencies, including DoC. The document sets a high standard for track specifications, defining six levels of tracks and leaving it to all agencies to determine the gap (and what to do about it) between their own trails and the standards set forth in this document.

See below the six categories of tracks identified in the handbook (see below). Definitions and detailed specifications are provided on p. 15 – 43 of the handbook, and Table 5 (p. 44-55), offers a useful comparison of the specifications for each of these six categories of tracks. Each track category is compared with the others on the basis of: General description; track formation, marking; minimum grade; steps; walking surface width; track surface; recommended footwear; boardwalks; minimum structure width; bridges across major watercourses; bridges across minor watercourses; guardrails, barriers, chains and handwires; viewing platforms; shelters; stiles, turnstiles and kissing gates; seats and picnic tables; vegetation clearance; signage; track condition information; historic tracks; and tracks for cyclists, mountain bikers, and pedestrians.

The classification of tracks largely corresponds to the DoC classification of Visitor Categories outlined above in section on Visitor Strategy (see B. above). These DoC visitor group designations are indicated (in parentheses) below. The categories, with abbreviated definitions, are:

Path – well formed on a durable surface, mostly urban for people of all fitness levels;
Short Walk – Well formed for all fitness levels, for walks of up to an hour; (Short Stop Travelers),
Walking Track – Suitable for walks of up to one full day for relatively inexperienced backcountry trampers; (Day Visitors),
Great Walk/Easy Tramping Track – multi-day tramping track catering for relatively inexperienced backcountry trampers; (Backcountry Comfort Seekers),
Tramping Track – Marked tramping track that generally follows the lay of the land and is commonly not formed. Key river crossings are bridged; (Backcountry Adventurers), and
Route – Generally unformed, lightly cut route catering for the most experienced of backcountry visitors. (Remoteness Seekers).

The last three categories are most relevant to huts. DoC defines these for trampers planning trips in some detail in their brochure “Planning a trip in the backcountry?”: