The New Zealand Historic Places Trust has been asked why it waited to use the "Resource Management Act sledgehammer" to protect what it says are an array of valuable archaeological sites in the Nevis Valley.
A special tribunal considering an amendment to a water conservation order on the Nevis River heard from three trust witnesses yesterday about the heritage values of the area.
The trust has supported moves to ban damming of the river.
Trust Otago-Southland regional archaeologist Matthew Schmidt said the archaeological landscape of the lower Nevis was of national importance and a ban on damming would protect this resource.
Tribunal chairman Richard Fowler asked why the trust was using a water conservation order to protect what it said were valuable sites.
"In a sense, isn't it back-to-front to say extending the river by impounding it will cover an archaeological site?" Mr Fowler asked.
If so many Nevis valley sites were valuable, why were they not registered for protection?
"You have your own mechanism for getting runs on the board, as it were, so an obvious question a cynic might ask is why are only two sites currently protected? Why is that list so short?" Mr Fowler said.
Dr Schmidt said no systematic survey of Nevis Valley sites had been done and there were more sites to record.
Trust Otago-Southland manager Owen Graham said the trust intervened when there was a risk to sites.
"But you're using the RMA sledgehammer to deal with the situation," Mr Fowler said.
Dr Schmidt said a significant number of archaeological sites from a range of time periods in New Zealand's history were still present in the Nevis.
"The majority of sites are of Pakeha/Chinese origin and are related to alluvial gold-mining from at least 1862 to the late 20th century, meaning this valley contains possibly the most preserved sequence of gold-mining history in Otago," Dr Schmidt said.
The area was a virtually undisturbed snapshot of the varied uses of a landscape by humans over a 700-year period.
Any dam on the Nevis River would compromise the historic heritage of the lower Nevis, he said.
