Resource Consent for development on corner of Tinakori Rd / Park St - Declined

The Hearings Commissioner has DECLINED the application by CapitalSkinz Limited to Wellington City Council to construct a three storey commercial building at 92 Tinakori Road Thorndon. This was to  comprise medical facilities, retail and café activities including associated earthworks and signage.

Click here to view the Commissioner's report.

Resource Consent Application for non-residential land use cnr Tinakori Rd & Park St

WCC have publicly notified an application for resource consent to build a commercial building on the corner of Tinakori Road (92,& 96-98) and Park Street (3-5).

The proposal is to construct a three-story commercial building (up to 11.95m high) comprising office, retail and cafe activities (i.e. all non-residential), and includes associated earthworks, signage and parking.

Notification documents are accessible from these links: 

1. Public Notice and instructions to submitters

2. Section 95A-95F notification decision report

3. WCC Advisors Assessments:

    a. Earthworks

    b. Contaminatamination

    c. Transportation

    d. Noise

    e. Vehicle access

    f. Urban Design

4. Cardno’s response to Section 92 Letter (further information provided)

5. Further Information

6. Application document

7. Application drawings/plans

Free online access to property valuation records

Here's an online resource that may interest Thorndon residents 
http://www.watchmystreet.co.nz/

An excerpt from the site ...

The vast majority of council rating valuation data in New Zealand is controlled by Quotable Value Limited (QV) - a New Zealand State owned enterprise who does most the the valuation work for councils in NZ and charges for that service.

Essentially they have the monopoly on council valuation work in NZ. QV and their Australian joint venture company PropertyIQ Limited (a company owned by QV and RP Data), obviously want to maximise profits and so they also license the use of council data and resell it to banks, real estate agents and the like - if you go to their website, they'll even resell your rating data back to you! (Remember you paid rates so that your council could pay for these valuations).

It does seem a bit bizarre that an Australian company to some degree controls access to New Zealand property data, but there you go.

The NZ Government has been promoting open access to government data, making it more available, allowing companies and individuals to add value and reinterpret the data - this is known as “Open Data”. Unfortunately to date it looks like the area of property data is outside this arrangement.

Some councils understand the value of providing their data in order to allow people like us to innovate, build cool tools, and provide useful or interesting information to ratepayers - including the Wellington City Council, who provided us with their District Valuation Record (all we had to do was pay for their time in extracting it). Big thumbs up to WCC!

Issues for Residents raised at TRA 2012 AGM

A range of important issues for residents emerged at the Thorndon Residents' Association Annual General Meeting. If you have an interest in:
- earthquake prone buildings
- traffic and parking 
- when someone (or something) damages your connecting sewer pipe (lateral) beyond your boundary, buried under the street, who is responsible?
- regional governance

then, take a moment to read the draft minutes from the TRA AGM

No extra consent rules

As part of preparations to make changes to the District Plan, WCC's Strategic and Policy Committee has decided that inner residential Thorndon shall face no additional consent rules.

Following three years of conversation between residents (TRA) and Council there is now increased recognition of the diversity of Thorndon's neighbourhoods and our 'living' suburb. And at least some appreciation that we need to enhance our homes with modern innovations without undue additional constraints imposed by the Regulator.

Proposed changes to the District Plan will publicly consulted before Council adopt them.

(click on the article to enlarge it)

WCC Strategy Committee to consider residential heritage in Thorndon

WCC's Strategy and Policy Committee is about to consider the approach to Heritage Management in the Residential Areas of Thorndon.

WCC's Strategy and Policy Committee have the reports/recommendations from Officers. The Committee is meeting on Thursday 23rd June, 2011.

These reports have only just become available for TRA representatives leaving little time digest the content or to consult with members.

Five (5) reports have been tabled for this agenda item. Link from WCC webpages:

http://www.wellington.govt.nz/haveyoursay/meetings/committee/Strategy_and_Policy/2011/23Jun0915/agenda.html

Draft Thorndon Design Guidelines

In mid May 2011, WCC's urban planners convened a workshop to discuss possible residential design guidelines for Thorndon. TRA representatives participated. Here is the draft report.

The revision marks are by the TRA's representatives. This report will be discussed at the WCC convened Thorndon Advisory Group meeting, Tuesday 7 June.

Background to the project.

Historic classification = lower resale

One of Auckland's oldest homes on a huge Parnell main street site has sold for $2.5 million - well below its QV rating valuation of $4.2 million. Someone is quoted saying "It reflects its historic classification - it is very restrictive what work you can do to any part of the property." Is this an exceptional case?

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10730154

How do we ensure that residential home owners in Thorndon don't end up bearing costs to benefit a wider good?

The New Zealand Institute for the Study of Competition and Regulation published a viewpoint on the issue. http://www.iscr.org.nz/f515,14989/14989_July_2009_ver7.pdf

Scroll to p14 - Non-compensation It's Not Just

Some of the older posts in this blog outline WCC's approach to introducing heritage provisions to our suburb. (click on the 'heritage' tag to find related posts)

Place-based planning - example feedback

click on the image to enlarge it

An example of feedback from TRA representatives provided to WCC's place-based study. This response characterised aspects of the Hobson precinct (area 10); illustrating gaps in the house style patterns (original style dwellings in green).

New Futures - rethinking heritage in New Zealand's urban places

http://www.historicplaces.org.nz/events/RypkemaWLN-17Nov.aspx

A seminar on 17 November 2010 will cover the following topics:

• Measuring the economic impact of heritage in urban revitalisation
• Adaptive reuse opportunities
• Planning and urban design tools to reduce barriers to investment in older buildings
• Public private partnerships in heritage conservation
• Case studies: myths and realities in the comparison of adaptive reuse and new construction

Mayor calls review of earthquake-strengthening policies

Mayor Prendergast is calling for a review of the Council's earthquake-strengthening policies. Council staff will be asked to canvas a number of issues including whether the Council should:

• revisit the review of the quake-prone buildings policy with a view to tightening the deadlines again
• seek relaxation, where appropriate, of heritage rules to allow more latitude and flexibility in strengthening work. This could include the replacement of heavy masonry features like parapets or chimneys with replicas built from light materials like glass-fibre, timber or carbon-fibre.
• consider changes to District Plan rules to allow the demolition of some older buildings with less heritage value
• look at rule changes to force some building owners, if they can't afford to strengthen, to remove heavy and dangerous features like parapets and chimneys from the roofs and facades of some buildings
• increase grant funding to help more building owners complete strengthening work.

Further information

Our Quake-risk Buildings: Mayor Seeks Review

Map of the fault rupture hazard area in Thorndon

GNSscience video about the Wellington Fault Line

Mayor's view after visiting Christchurch (15/9/10)

Thorndon Residential Project - initialisation stage

The thinking caps are now on for the place-based study of residential Thorndon. This proposal was an outcome following the extensive consultation undertaken during 2009/10 on options for managing Thorndon's residential heritage.

An initial meeting was held this week with WCC's Director Strategy, Planning and Urban Design (Teena Pennington) and others, including Councillors. Teena has extended the invitation to the community to provide feedback on the suggested approach. In particular, ideas on overall project engagement and ideas on specific engagement opportunities that would be helpful at defined stages of the project.

It is envisaged that an engagement plan will be confirmed in conjunction with the Thorndon community.

Please add comments to this post, or email thorndonresidents@gmail.com

Update (23 September)

The TRA sub-committee has carefully reviewed WCC's initial documents. The committee has provided comments and redrawn the diagram of the proposed workflow (to emphasise the importance of engagement of the community as an active part of the decision-making process).

• TRA feedback
• community collaboration model / workflow diagram

WCC Heritage Grants for Thorndon properties

On the 16 September WCC's Strategy and Policy committee will consider a report seeking approval for the allocation of grants to applicants in the July 2010 round of the Built Heritage Incentive Fund (BHIF).

This round proposes grants to nine applicants. Three of the properties are within Thorndon. If approved these three will receive funding summing $32,098. The total yearly fund is $200,000. This is the first of three bidding rounds for the 2010/11 financial year.

The latest report recommends that a 4th application for a Thorndon residence be declined because it is not included on the District Plan Heritage List and is not in a Heritage Area.

WCC recommendations on heritage management in residential Thorndon

A report for WCC's Strategy and Policy Committee (SPC) was released today. It reports on the outcomes of the consultation process and recommends an approach to managing the heritage values of Thorndon.

Five regulatory options have been identified to better manage heritage values in residential Thorndon.

The TRA sub-committee is reviewing the report. The committee would like to hear your views and to collate feedback for Councillors. You are invited to share your views by emailing thorndonresidents@gmail.com by 5PM Monday 2nd August 2010. Otherwise make a comment to this post.

There is only a small window of opportunity for the TRA committee to collate and provide Association feedback in time for the SPC meeting on Thursday morning ( 5th August ).

Radio NZ programme on heritage

Should councils and government interfere with the rights and intentions of private property owners? On Radio NZ's Sunday Morning programme today Chris Laidlaw discussed the issues surrounding heritage architecture with architects Marshall Cook and Jeremy Salmond. And campaigner Allan Matson explained some of the legal issues that can help or hinder the preservation of historic buildings.

A now familiar (to those in Thorndon following the residential heritage conversation) range of questions arose and opinions shared. Here are some snippets (follow the link above to hear their context) :

• Have we got the rules right?
• What is the right division of responsibility?
• Is it an issue of selective keeping?
• Is it subjective and hard to sort the value from the dramatic?
• Can you really have hard and fast rules?
• New buildings should be better than those they replace.
• The villa doesn't have any particular intrinsic value; it's out of date with contemporary lifestyles.
• Will we see villas gradually replaced?
• All about streetscape and quality of the street too - walls, footpaths, cars, trees, etc.
• Evolution rather than revolution.
• Don't freeze things in time.
• Link between garden city suburb and the city is important.
• How many modern buildings can you put into a traditional suburb and then still call it a traditional suburb?
• When constraints are placed on a precinct then it becomes a political issue. Planning, property, and the value of land lead inevitably to it being a political issue.
• Private property rights are sacrosanct.
• Can a urban design panel have sufficient opinion to influence their Commissioners?
• It seems that heritage is a legitimate part of town planning but it is a retrospective act ... it is always evaluating by looking back.
• It is important to keep mobility in thinking.
• Is a regulatory shakeup needed?
• We're always in transition.

We look forward to seeing what Wellington's regulators are thinking when their report is made public early in August.

Residential heritage – the next report

At a special meeting with the TRA held on 29th June, Teena Pennington, WCC’s Director for Strategy and Urban Design, provided an update on recent developments. These related specifically to the public consultations earlier this year and all the matters arising during the extended community conversation on managing Thorndon residential heritage values.

The urban planners’ work was initially undertaken within a framework of WCC’s rolling reviews of the City’s district plan. The question of heritage had been wrapped into one of these reviews. Following strong community reaction, the council agreed to an extended community consultation specifically for Thorndon. It was acknowledged that since 2009 considerably more is now known about the issues, including how the status quo is not a desirable state of affairs, either. Many stories have been uncovered of difficult and unsatisfactory resource consent processes under current council arrangements.

Questions remain unanswered on the issue of whether resource consents are necessarily the best or only option for managing residential properties and streetscapes in Thorndon. Members raised many additional questions: about principles, individual property rights, compensation, and governance of streetscapes.

A council officers’ report on the community consultation - summarising the outcomes and making recommendations - is being prepared for the council’s Strategy and Policy Committee meeting on August 5th 2010. The Council has publicly committed itself to being guided and informed by what the community wants. Council officers have confirmed their report will be made public a week before the committee meeting. The TRA awaits the report with interest.

Heritage zoning ... it's not just

If the heritage proposals go awry it could represent a serious assault on private property rights for residents of Thorndon.

Last year the New Zealand Institute for the Study of Competition and Regulation Inc. explored some high-profile events that highlight the inconsistencies inherent in New Zealand's fragmented approach to property right protection. On Page 14 of the July 2009 edition of the Institute's newsletter a case is outlined for compensation when these rights are violated as a consequence of local-government decisions.