Freedom Camping

The proposed Freedom Camping in Vehicles Bylaw is Auckland Council’s response to the Freedom Camping Act 2011. It proposes significant and radical change from the current rules in most of Auckland, opening up almost all roads and council land (except reserve land) across Auckland to freedom camping. Public consultation was held in Nov/Dec 2021.

Councillors proposed only 45 individual public sites across Auckland where freedom camping will be prohibited (apart from reserve land). They chose not to include any sites that the 21 Local Boards put forward to them (including the Kaipātiki sites listed here), and will not consider any new sites that came from the public consultation until AFTER the bylaw is adopted in late 2022.

That means there will likley need to be a further round of public consultation in 2023/24 to consider any of the suggested prohibited sites… 🤦‍♂️

The proposed bylaw includes:

allowing freedom camping in vehicles on all roads, except where there are already restrictions (yellow lines, time restrictions). This could also include carparks outside local shops, slip-roads, carparks servicing ferry wharves, etc, where they are within the road corridor.
allowing freedom camping in vehicles on all council land, except reserves. This could include carparks at council facilities (libraries, leisure centres, community centres), parks that haven’t been gazetted as reserves, etc.
allowing freedom campers to stay a maximum of two nights in the same road or off-road parking area, before they need to move to another road or parking area.
requiring freedom campers to vacate their parking space by 9am on the day of departure.
requiring freedom campers to not return to the same road or off-road parking area within a two-week period.
requiring all freedom campers to use certified self-contained vehicles.
specifying only 45 prohibited sites and 22 restricted sites across Auckland.