Kerre Woodham: I'm a fan of building around the train stations - with caveats

The Government has instructed Auckland Council to allow apartment buildings of at least 15 storeys near key train stations as the City Rail Link nears completion. Housing Minister Chris Bishop and Auckland Minister Simeon Brown said the Government would require Auckland to allow even greater housing and development around the CRL stations than had been planned, to ensure that Auckland takes economic advantage of this transformational investment in the city.  

So at the moment it requires Auckland to allow for greater density around the key stations of Maungawhau (Mount Eden), Kingsland, and Morningside. The bill currently provides that Auckland Council must enable, within a walkable distance, from these station heights and densities, reflective of the higher demand for housing and business in these areas, and at a minimum, no less than six storeys.  

So it makes sense, you build communities and hubs around the train stations. However, the Government decided these requirements don't go far enough, and therefore they want to see an extension of the requirement to enable heights and densities to two additional stations, Mount Albert and Baldwin Ave, require upzoning, allowing buildings of at least 15 storeys high around Mount Eden, Kingsland, and Morningside, and 10 storeys high around Mount Albert and Baldwin Ave stations. Simeon Brown says Mount Albert and Baldwin stations are ripe for development sitting close to Unitex's campus and Mount Albert’s shops and cafes.  

Bernard Osman has read has written a very good piece in the New Zealand Herald - I was quite surprised to find that Auckland has few apartment buildings of 15 storeys or more. You imagine it's full of skyscrapers, it’s not at all. The Metropolis has 40 storeys – I suppose that was the oldest, highest building. Pacifica has 57 floors. The Seascape Tower was going to be 56, they've stopped construction on that. There's a 15 storey apartment building out in West Auckland in Henderson, which looks absolutely lovely. And to me, it makes common sense – you have to build up, you can't keep going out.  

And building around the train stations makes perfect sense, with a few caveats. I want to know what measures are in place, what safeguards there are in place around design and construction to ensure we do not see a repeat of the absolute monstrosities that were spewed up in the Auckland Central City over the past two decades. They are absolutely hideous – how anyone can live in them is beyond me. They serve absolutely no purpose. They're rotting, they're continually under construction and remediation, they've caused nothing but problems for anyone who's had the misfortune to own them, they are ugly and are blight on the landscape. Just looking at them makes me dispirited, far less living in them. Pigsties have more visual appeal and space, and are better constructed. Apartment buildings can be beautiful and functional – there are plenty of examples of those that are.  

And there have to be safeguards in place to ensure that that's what people will be getting in their communities, in their neighbourhoods, in their areas. There's got to be green spaces, there has to be parking. Not everybody's going to be on a bicycle, you know, there are older people who love living in the city. They love the vibrancy, they love living within communities, they love living in suburbs. Perhaps they've had the big house in the suburb, they don't want to leave the suburb, they want something smaller but having the train to be able to get in and around and about it makes perfect sense. You've got to have the communities who are going to live in these apartments at the forefront when it comes to design, and close behind, their neighbours.  

So what are the safeguards? And I want to see those safeguards in place before I'm grabbing my pom poms and my cheerleader skirt and leaping up and down about it. At the moment, I'm taking the cheerleader costume out of storage, ready to put on, but it's not on yet. I want to make sure that those safeguards are in place before I enthusiastically support it.  

And the second is how do we feel about central government overriding a city's unitary plan? I like what the government's proposing to do. But what's to stop a Labour/Green/Te Pāti Māori government coming in and ordering a city or region to comply with its own version of what is right and proper? What is the point of a unitary plan if central government laws can trump public consultation? And while I agree with the caveats I've mentioned, I think it makes perfect sense, it's certainly not going to happen overnight, even with the best will in the world and a government that wants to make things happen. But what’s to stop the next government coming in and overriding the unitary plan in your region because there's something they want to do? 

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