Hutt River

The Hutt River in flood - Lower Hutt

The Hutt River is a steep alluvial river that starts in the Tararua Ranges and enters Wellington Harbour at Petone. The river drains mountainous terrain in the southern Tararua and Rimutaka Ranges and streams and rivers from the Eastern and Western Hutt hills.

The catchment covers 655 km (that's more than seven times the area of Wellington Harbour!) and contains the Hutt River East and West, the Akatarawa, Pakuratahi and Mangaroa Rivers. All of these rivers feed into the Hutt River, so a storm in any part of the catchment could result in flooding. It takes only seven hours for heavy rain at the top of the catchment to turn into floodwaters at the Hutt River mouth.

Hutt River Floodplain Management

Greater Wellington works with our regions communities to manage the flood risk from rivers in our catchments. Our approach to managing flood risk is to understand river and floodplain processes and provide a coordinated response through our floodplain management plans in partnership with the community.

Hutt Floodplain Management Brochure [1.2MB] [this is designed to be printed at A3 size]

Hutt River Flood Hazard Maps

The map below shows an overview of the Hutt Valley. To find out flood hazard information about a specific area, download the plan number shown below from the flood map box on the right of this page.

 Alternatively you can view our GIS maps online.