Team Effort Delivers Results

South Auckland’s Totara Park is a 216-hectare open space park, featuring natural areas, bush walks and mountain bike trails. This fantastic community asset is under the management of Auckland Council (Te Kaunihera o Tāmaki Makaurau) and caring for this special place falls under the Open Space Management (OSM) contract that Citycare Property has in our super city. Totara Park is a hidden gem, with the bike trails recognised as providing the perfect mix for a range of abilities - and with great names like Sunset Boulevard, Anaconda and Pony Express who wouldn’t want to explore!

With maintenance of the tracks falling on the Citycare Property team and health and safety of riders being paramount, it’s important that any maintenance requests are dealt with quickly and efficiently.

In late February Matt Winiata, the chairman of the Manurewa Local Board, made an urgent call to Citycare Property Community Partnerships Lead, Jody Deer, alerting her to a recently formed rut in one of the tracks that was creating issues for riders and that required immediate attention.

Within 30 minutes of the call coming in we had a team of people on the track with their tools ready to go. Working with Kelvin Hieatt, a member of the Papakura Local Board and a member of the Totara Park Mountain Bike Committee, the team quickly identified the area requiring immediate attention and remediation. In the meantime, Matt also arrived on site, with a trailer, a wheelbarrow, and shovels in tow, ready to roll up his sleeves and get stuck in alongside the Citycare Property team. It was a great team effort to ensure there was a swift resolution, with the track restored for mountain bikers to once again safely take on the challenge of achieving a “clean” ride on what can be a “gnarly” track.

While the on track work was taking place Jody was stationed strategically to give riders a heads up about the workers on site, ensuring a safe working environment.

The Citycare Property OSM team is supported in their role by a well-qualified and dedicated in house team who manage incoming calls and delegation of work to make sure the most appropriate action is taken in the most efficient manner. All team members have access to EventManager, Citycare Property’s proprietary technology solution that integrates data capture, management and reporting and is also used to track jobs from start to finish. It means both our clients and us know what’s happening where and in real time.

“The Totara Park experience in February was an excellent example of elected representatives, Matt and Kelvin, joining with the Citycare Property team both on the ground and behind the scenes, to deliver an exceptional outcome for the community, says Jody Deer. “It’s a great demonstration of the results that can be achieved when people who genuinely care about delivery come together with a shared goal”.