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Fascinating facts • 15 per cent of the city’s land area is covered by parks • 700 hectares of ecologically important natural areas are protected within land owned by North Shore City Council • 145 kilometres of the city’s coastline is in parks land: • that is 78 per cent of the western coastline and 53 per cent of the eastern coastline. • There are 122 playgrounds in the city • Long Bay Regional Park is the only Auckland Regional Park in the city protected within land owned by North Shore City Council

North Shore Parks Strategy (PDF 2.40MB)

Our Parks

North Shore City has a unique natural environment which includes sandy beaches, sandstone cliffs, large areas of native bush, volcanic cones and craters, estuaries and many different native plants and animals.

North Shore City has more than 520 parks, including 90 sportsfields, 122 children’s playgrounds and over 150 bush reserves. Together the city’s parks cover an area of more than 1700 hectares of land. They reach from the new Sanders Reserve in Paremoremo to Long Bay Reserve in the north (East Coast Bays) to Windsor Reserve in the south (Devonport).

Many parks are owned and managed by the North Shore City Council on behalf of the city’s residents. There are also parks in the city that are managed by other agencies, for example, North Head in Devonport is managed by the Department of Conservation (DoC) and Long Bay Regional Park is managed by the Auckland Regional Council (ARC).

Why are parks important?

Parks have a wide range of functions and offer many benefits to the community.

Parks help the environment by:
• providing healthy places (habitats) for native plants and animals to live
• absorbing noise pollution and contaminants from the air and water
• helping to sustain and enhance biodiversity (the diversity of life) within the city
• ensuring that our natural environment is protected, enhanced and promoted

Parks help people by:
• providing a space to exercise and play
• enhancing quality of life
• giving people an opportunity to get out and see nature

Parks help the economy by:
• attracting visitors (tourists)
• providing amenity to the built environment, which in turn
adds value to surrounding properties

Parks enhance culture by:
• protecting sites of cultural significance (pa sites and kumara pits)
• giving people an opportunity for cultural expression (festivals and events)
• helping to interpret and teach people about cultural resources