Muriwai is renowned as one of Auckland's wild west coast beaches, but could it also become a seaport?
Muriwai's one of several locations under consideration by a group investigating the city's future shipping activities.
It wasn't looking good for a swim at Muriwai Beach this afternoon, and if there were big ships pulling up, it wouldn't look good either.
It's an area being looked at by those investigating options for Auckland's future port activities but luckily for those against that idea, big shipping companies aren't buying it either.
"I don't see Muriwai as a port," president of New Zealand Shipping Federation, Steven Chapman says.
Muriwai is just one area being looked at, with a port future study group identifying several potential sites across Waikato, the Bay of Plenty, Northland and Auckland itself.
It says it wants to find a site that's capable of supporting infrastructure and future growth.
During the process of finding that site, it may find other areas that aren't suitable because of economic, cultural, social and environmental concerns.
Mr Chapman believes west coast developments would be high-risk and high-cost due to the number of harbours with sand bars.
"That combined with a shallow depth, and the maintenance of those bars to provide that depth required to accept bigger ships would be, in my view, cost-prohibitive."
Whangarei is another area being investigated but that is much to the delight of local businesses.
There is still a lot of water to go under the wharf before any concrete decisions are made though.
A shortlist of recommendations will be made to Auckland Council at the end of June.
Newshub.
