https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360609717/coroner-recommends-permanent-fencing-wellington-waterfront
It will be too hard and too expensive to fence all the wharves, jetties and pontoons which would also make them useless for their intended use – mooring vessels. Wellington spends all its money on bike racks, rainbow crossings and vanity theatre projects so no money available either.
Of course personal responsibility is a foreign concept – you know – not getting pissed and falling in. So the only alternative is to just lock the public out of the waterfront. You wait and see.
No Minister 
I read that today and thought “what insanity is this?”
Then I remembered that I live in Wellington and it’s just another normal day here.
” not getting pissed and falling in. ”
I firmly believe that neither of the two who have drowned by falling off the wharves simply ‘fell off the wharf.’ Yes, they were drunk (post mortem toxicity tests would show) but they must also have been doing something stupid like “tightrope walking” along the vehicle barrier strip along the edge of the wharf or similar. Put up a fence (at a reported cost of $11 million – which will no doubt treble by the time it is built) – and the same people will try to walk along the top of the fence.