Only two streets in Invercargill have been given a Māori name since the adoption of its new road-naming policy last year, a council manager says.
On June 1, 2022, the Invercargill City Council’s revised road-naming policy came into effect.
Strategy and policy manager Rhiannon Suter said the document was adopted to ensure the timely and consistent selection of road names across the region reflected the identity of the local community, and enable Māori culture to be more visible in the city.
In April last year, policy adviser Hayden Powell said the document was developed after a request from the council, which had been using the Australia-New Zealand standard for rural and urban addressing as its main framework for street naming.
The council is working with mana whenua representatives to create a list of pre-approved names in te reo.
When a new road needs to be named, the approved name is put forward as one of the three options for the council to consider.
In a statement this week, Ms Suter said since the policy’s implementation a year ago, nine new roads within the Invercargill boundary had been named.
"Two of which are in te reo.
"They are named Tane Way and Rakau Lane and have not yet been constructed.
"The remaining seven were named after local historic references, including soldiers and local industry or commonly used terms for the road, such as Dairy Way and Brunswick Way."
Since the policy came in last year, 10 name suggestions had been received — nine had been resolved and one was being processed.
There were planned subdivisions which had not yet entered the naming process, she said.
