Not In My Back Yard.
For decades, that has been a battle cry for suburbanites and homeowners unimpressed by changes happening in their neighbourhood.
But, how often are those complaints valid, or are they just people unhappy with change?
With both a 16.5 metre tall Buddha statue in Waiwera Valley, and a helipad in Westmere getting people talking, today on The Front Page we’re looking into the resource management process and why some things get approved, and others don’t.
Later, we’ll talk with Associate Professor Caroline Miller from Massey University’s Resource and Environmental Planning Programme.
But first, for details on that giant Buddha statue, we’re talking to NZ Herald senior reporter David Fisher.
Follow The Front Page on iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
You can read more about this and other stories in the New Zealand Herald, online at nzherald.co.nz, or tune in to news bulletins across the NZME network.
Host: Chelsea Daniels
Sound Engineer/Producer: Richard Martin
Producer: Ethan Sills
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Kiyota.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
I'm Chelsea Daniels and this is the Front Page, a
daily podcast presented by the New Zealand Herald.
Speaker 3 (00:16):
Not in my backyard.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
For decades, that's been the battle cry for suburbanites and
homeowners unimpressed by changes happening in their neighborhood. But how
often are those complaints valid or are they just people
unhappy with change? With both a sixteen point five meter
tall Buddhist statue in Why We're the Valley and a
(00:39):
helipad in Westmere getting people talking today on the Front Page,
we're looking into the resource management process and why some
things get approved and others don't. Later we'll talk with
Associate Professor Caroline Miller from Massi University's Resource and Environmental
Planning program. But first, for details on that giant Buddhist statue,
(01:02):
we're talking to Nsitt Harold Senior reporter David Fisher. Some
basic questions first, David, where is this statue being built?
Speaker 3 (01:13):
Who's building it and why are they doing so?
Speaker 4 (01:16):
Let me start if I can by painting a picture
of sorts Wyverta Valley is north of Auckland, south of Poohoy,
and it is this beautiful rural valley. It is rolling
hills and quite steep ridges, regenerating native bush and the
rolling hills as you come down from the steep hills,
(01:37):
a green pastures and it's quite harsy, lovely paddics. It's
a real rural paradise and people have gone there and
they've got lifestyle blocks and lovely houses that are built
around the rim of this valley, sort of looking towards
the center where there is a sixty meter hill. Now
that's sixty meter hill. Buildings started on it a couple
of months ago. The neighbors couldn't really work out what
(01:59):
was going going on. They started doing a little bit
of detective work and found out that what was going
on was that someone they didn't know who was building
a sixteen and a half meter tall Buddhist statue and
plinth five meter tall plinth with an eleven and a
half but of statue on top of it that's going
to be golden. They were quite upset that they never
(02:22):
got to have a say in this before the building began.
Speaker 3 (02:25):
Who's building this statue? Why are they doing it?
Speaker 1 (02:28):
Well?
Speaker 4 (02:28):
Who is a charity that's called the jets Grove Charitable Trust.
Jetters Grove, named after an important Buddhist temple based in India.
The why, well, that's somewhat of a difficult question. I mean,
the charity, Jetts Grove Charitable Trust has said now in
a letter that's come a couple of months down the
(02:50):
track from building beginning, they have said that they are
building this as a gift to the community. They say
that they're very grateful to New Zealand for its open minded, tolerant,
respectful approach to culture, that it's a nation of kind
hearted people with communities that, as they say, are beautifully
(03:11):
integrated across different ethnic groups. And as a reflection of that,
they have decided that they would like to build the
statue and give it to the people of New Zealand
as a gift. The neighbors of wyw'd A Valley are
more of a mind to say return to sender, thanks,
thanks for the offer, but no thanks, But they don't
actually get a say.
Speaker 2 (03:30):
And the neighbors that you've spoken to the described it
as horrifying.
Speaker 4 (03:34):
Why is that, Well, there's a tremendous number of words
that have been used to describe the statue. Monstrosity, horrifying,
blight on the landscape, all of these sorts of things.
It's because it really will look very different from anything
else that is in that valley. And actually, I think
(03:54):
if you throw a net across the entirety of the
North of Auckland, which would include the Gibbs far that
has these extraordinary works of art, it still looks very
different from anything that you would see anywhere in North
of Auckland, and that is because it is a large
statue of religious iconography today or say, they wouldn't care
(04:15):
if it was a statue of Christ or a Canoo
figure or whatever religion it might be. It's this thing
that is sticking out like the proverbial on top of
a tall hill that's going to be gold. It will
shine in the sun where the sun comes up in
the morning, and they just don't want it.
Speaker 5 (04:36):
The size is just it's monstrous for a valley like this.
It's going to be very visible from all the properties
around here. It's going to be bright gold, which just
doesn't make sense in a rural environment. It's a faithful
replication of apparently an image of gurum Posh. To my mind,
(04:58):
that describes a religious and dormant it doesn't describe art,
and so.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
This didn't need to be approved because it counts as
a work of art. Is that right?
Speaker 5 (05:11):
That's right?
Speaker 4 (05:11):
And this is a really this is a really interesting
thing about this Auckland Council process and about the approval
process for this Buddhist statue. When the application was put
in by the Jettis Grove Charitable Trust to build the statue,
they described it as a work of art and it
it led it to neighbors. They have said it was designed,
(05:31):
it was crafted by a Taiwanese artist and they say
it is a work of art. So under the Auckland
Council Unitary Plan, which is Auckland Council's wolves for building
in the wider Auckland area, if something is designated as
a work of art, it isn't a rural area. You
don't need to go through the resource consent process. You
(05:52):
go through a completely different process at all, where you
don't need to consult with your neighbors. You can just
go ahead and you can build it.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
Do you reckon that's a bit of a loophole in
the law.
Speaker 4 (06:02):
Well, the neighbors certainly think it's a loophole. And you know,
I talked to some ferociously clever academics that have spent
their life working in art and studying art, and the
outcome of those conversations was basically artist in the eye
of the beholder. What might be art to me might
not be art to you. There are precedent cases in
(06:24):
New Zealand of things that one might not see it
as art being described as art. There was a shipping
container in Hamilton that had a door in the side
and a window around the other side that was found
to be a piece of art because it was commentary
on housing and New Zealand. One of those academics that
I spoke to, he had said, the problem here isn't
(06:47):
that this is art or this isn't art. The problem
here is the Auckland Council decision making process. Because you
can call it anything art and it will be to
someone and so you can build anything you like.
Speaker 2 (06:59):
Thanks for joining us, David, Thanks very much. We're now
joined by Associate professor from Massi University's Resource and Environmental
Planning program, Caroline Miller. Can you just outline for us
(07:26):
the standard planning process for councils in New Zealand, if.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
That be sics right planning one on one? If you
want to do something on your property, then you one
of the first things you need to do is to
check your district and regional plans. So we're presuming it
might be in a rural environment or in an open one,
but you have eased the district plan, and the district
plan will list a series of activities as the Act
(07:54):
calls them, So that could be housing, it could be retail,
could be some industrial activity. Having defined what these different
activities are, then you determine what type of controls might
be needed to ensure that they fit into the environment
in which they're established and that they don't cause a
(08:15):
huge array of negative impacts for the people around them.
So essentially, what planning does says, here's your opportunity to
put forward what you want to do. In many cases,
it's what we call a permitted activity. So there are
some standards in the plan which you have to meet.
So in a housing situation, you may have to be
(08:38):
so many meters off a boundary, there'll be a restriction
on how high you can go to ensure there's an overshadowing, etc.
The activity could be quite complicated. So if we look
at a couple of these things that we've recently seen
they have looked at things like helicopter landing pads, probably
(08:59):
be on their experience of existing ones in urban and
rural areas, and then they would define the activity or
a landing pound for a helicopter and then decide what
level of controls you need to ensure that it doesn't
have significant adverse effects on surrounding properties and the people
(09:24):
who lived there.
Speaker 2 (09:25):
That's the helipad in Westmere that Anna Moobray and Ali
Williams have been fighting over. This has been obviously a
contentious process for some time, and that got approved just
the other week against the wishes of the community, and
it's led to some locals to say that they've lost
faith in the resource management process.
Speaker 3 (09:45):
Do you think that's fair?
Speaker 1 (09:46):
No, I don't think it is at all, Because they
have all benefited from the resource management process, they perhaps
don't recognize that at the most basic level, we've ensured
that nobody is going to build a large, noisy, dirty
factory next, because you've separated our activities and gathered to
(10:08):
ones together that are largely compatible with each other. So
in a residential area, they'll be provisioned for school, childcare centers,
sorts of things which fit into a residential zone. What
you do then get are a whole lot of activities
which might be acceptable or can be made acceptable in
(10:29):
terms of controlling anverse effects. But you need to examine
them on a one by one beast and that is
clearly where you have got. These helipads being seen to
be some dispute on this are restricted or a discretionary activity?
Speaker 6 (10:50):
Yeah, copses by residents in Auckland are pushing back against
a new helicopter pad Zuru co founder Animobra and Habbi
Ali Williams have applied to build one on their property.
Neighbors fear it may cause harm to local birds. I
just think Ali Williams is hoping that if he builds
a helicopter pad, maybe maybe Richie McCall will finally come
and visit. Do you think he calls it an allicopter?
Speaker 3 (11:15):
Oh my god, how the whole thing came.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
He doesn't want a helipair, He was like, I want
to build an alli pad. Is it enough for a
community to simply not like something, for counsel to have
to change its mind when it comes to consenting all
different kinds of plans.
Speaker 1 (11:37):
No, the act says you must demonstrate that you are
adversely affected, and that is harder perhaps than people think. Look,
this particular decision is a real matter of judgment and
I would be surprised if it doesn't go to appeal
(11:59):
because I think that this is one of perhaps it's
just a small number of people seeking helipads in established
residential area. I know there's a lot on y Heki,
but you can see, well, that is a very mixed area.
It's not densely urban, it's partly rural, partly rural residential, etc.
(12:21):
So you might expect things like helicopters in that environment.
All that the evidence that they have been presented. However,
that doesn't mean that they may be overalled by a
higher authority. And that's what the Environment Court exists for
so that people can say, we're not happy with this decision,
(12:43):
we believe is defective in the following ways, we want
the Environment Court to consider it. And in New Zealands
our system is very often in terms of giving people
the right to make comment on these sorts of development
and also give them a path to a higher level
of appeal. It's not actually a standard point of every
(13:06):
other planning system. Across the world. We have always had
a very generous system in that regard. However, in the end,
from my experience, some people will never be happy.
Speaker 2 (13:18):
What about when it comes to a sixteen meter tall
Buddha statue in why We're the Valley right now?
Speaker 1 (13:25):
That is an interesting one, definitely a one off. However,
as the cancel has pointed out, the plan has a
new definition of what is art, because remember, art is
in the eye of the beholder. I couldn't imagine you
being able to easily write a definition of what is art.
For the people who are erecting it, this is a
(13:46):
symbol of their faith. So in many ways, if you
think about it, cathedrals have great height and steeples, etc.
Because they are again indications of faith. In this case,
it's going to be put into a rural residential area
where essentially there's just brassland around it, on undulating land.
(14:09):
It will be prominent, but because the activity has not
been defined, there will be nothing in the plan that
controls it. Yes, it will be a prominent structure, but
I think that is the whole point. These people want
this as a signal of their faith.
Speaker 2 (14:29):
Do you think that from now it gives credence to
the fact that perhaps something like that should be in
future plans.
Speaker 1 (14:35):
Yes, yes, it might be. But remember when you sit
down and write a district plan, and have done this myself,
you have got to try and look at what is
in the world in front of you and what might
be in the world ten years ahead. So you're trying
to predict the future. So yes, the district plan would
have had to have contemplated that, but there's no real
(14:59):
signal I think that this sort of thing was going
to emerge. So yes, sometimes district plans don't actually contemplate
activity because remember, plans take a long time to go
through the processes, partly because we allow a lot of
consultation and submission, right and so, but the time a
(15:20):
plan comes into operation, it's already a number of views,
all in terms of the environment of whatever you want
to call it that it's based on. Yeah, but again,
how do you write a definition of art and what
is acceptable to me might not be acceptable to you.
But also, this is a rural residential area and there
(15:43):
will be a lot of other toll structures could come
into that environment. Wind power turbines come to mind, and
our hells are decorated with them. You can't stand anywhere
in the city of palmstanth No and not see your
wind turbine.
Speaker 3 (15:56):
If I wanted to build a wind turbine, say in
the middle of Palmerston North, and the council said no,
could I erect one anyway and call it art?
Speaker 1 (16:05):
I date it. I date it because there will be
a definition of a wind turbine in the district plan
and what you're proposing to do is covered by it.
Speaker 3 (16:16):
What if I bidazzle it, I.
Speaker 1 (16:17):
Know it won't make any difference in essence of it. Look,
you can, and you could properly find a kese where
you could do something, But for instance, in a residential area,
generally there are hype restrictions. Yeah, I can see. I
can see both sides of this. I can see why
the neighbors are very upset, and I can see why
(16:37):
of the people promoting it want to do it.
Speaker 3 (16:40):
How do planners balance competing interests?
Speaker 2 (16:44):
I guess, like economic development, you've got environmental protection and
community needs and want How do they balance all of
that in their decision making?
Speaker 3 (16:52):
Is it basically based on precedents to some extent?
Speaker 1 (16:56):
But remember planners don't make decisions. They present evidence with
a recommendation, but that recommendation can and is ignored because
the decision makers see that situation in a different way
what the plant does as they see. The first thing
(17:17):
you look at is what are the effects, who are
they going to affect, and what can we do to mitigate,
to reduce or even eliminate that effect. So, for instance,
if you wanted to build a particular building see a
small avatar in the rural area, people might not want
(17:37):
to see that. Therefore, one way of addressing the visual
impact of that on the neighbors would be to have
planting around it, to have it well set off boundaries
with the neighbors, etc. However, people sometimes don't care if
there are conditions that are going to mitigate, reduce, or
(18:01):
eliminate the effect because they don't believe that will actually
happen and it can't be demonstrated. Unfortunately, until the activity
takes place gets developed, there are at times unexpected effects
that neither the applicant nor the decision makers have actually predicted.
(18:24):
But in most cases, at the moment that artwork will
look like a visual assault to everybody who can see it,
because they are very focused on it and they don't like.
With time, my prediction would be that people will eventually
incorporate it into their view of the environment in which
(18:46):
they live.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
Thanks for joining us, Caroline.
Speaker 2 (18:52):
That's it for this episode of The Front Page. You
can read more about today's stories and extensive news coverage
at ends at harold co dot nz. The Front Page
is produced by Ethan Sills and Richard Martin, who is
also a sound engineer.
Speaker 3 (19:08):
I'm Chelsea Daniels.
Speaker 2 (19:10):
Subscribe to the Front Page on iHeartRadio or wherever you
get your podcasts, and tune in tomorrow for another look
behind the headlines.
Kiyota.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
I'm Chelsea Daniels and this is the Front Page, a
daily podcast presented by the New Zealand Herald.
Speaker 3 (00:16):
Not in my backyard.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
For decades, that's been the battle cry for suburbanites and
homeowners unimpressed by changes happening in their neighborhood. But how
often are those complaints valid or are they just people
unhappy with change? With both a sixteen point five meter
tall Buddhist statue in Why We're the Valley and a
(00:39):
helipad in Westmere getting people talking today on the Front Page,
we're looking into the resource management process and why some
things get approved and others don't. Later we'll talk with
Associate Professor Caroline Miller from Massi University's Resource and Environmental
Planning program. But first, for details on that giant Buddhist statue,
(01:02):
we're talking to Nsitt Harold Senior reporter David Fisher. Some
basic questions first, David, where is this statue being built?
Speaker 3 (01:13):
Who's building it and why are they doing so?
Speaker 4 (01:16):
Let me start if I can by painting a picture
of sorts Wyverta Valley is north of Auckland, south of Poohoy,
and it is this beautiful rural valley. It is rolling
hills and quite steep ridges, regenerating native bush and the
rolling hills as you come down from the steep hills,
(01:37):
a green pastures and it's quite harsy, lovely paddics. It's
a real rural paradise and people have gone there and
they've got lifestyle blocks and lovely houses that are built
around the rim of this valley, sort of looking towards
the center where there is a sixty meter hill. Now
that's sixty meter hill. Buildings started on it a couple
of months ago. The neighbors couldn't really work out what
(01:59):
was going going on. They started doing a little bit
of detective work and found out that what was going
on was that someone they didn't know who was building
a sixteen and a half meter tall Buddhist statue and
plinth five meter tall plinth with an eleven and a
half but of statue on top of it that's going
to be golden. They were quite upset that they never
(02:22):
got to have a say in this before the building began.
Speaker 3 (02:25):
Who's building this statue? Why are they doing it?
Speaker 1 (02:28):
Well?
Speaker 4 (02:28):
Who is a charity that's called the jets Grove Charitable Trust.
Jetters Grove, named after an important Buddhist temple based in India.
The why, well, that's somewhat of a difficult question. I mean,
the charity, Jetts Grove Charitable Trust has said now in
a letter that's come a couple of months down the
(02:50):
track from building beginning, they have said that they are
building this as a gift to the community. They say
that they're very grateful to New Zealand for its open minded, tolerant,
respectful approach to culture, that it's a nation of kind
hearted people with communities that, as they say, are beautifully
(03:11):
integrated across different ethnic groups. And as a reflection of that,
they have decided that they would like to build the
statue and give it to the people of New Zealand
as a gift. The neighbors of wyw'd A Valley are
more of a mind to say return to sender, thanks,
thanks for the offer, but no thanks, But they don't
actually get a say.
Speaker 2 (03:30):
And the neighbors that you've spoken to the described it
as horrifying.
Speaker 4 (03:34):
Why is that, Well, there's a tremendous number of words
that have been used to describe the statue. Monstrosity, horrifying,
blight on the landscape, all of these sorts of things.
It's because it really will look very different from anything
else that is in that valley. And actually, I think
(03:54):
if you throw a net across the entirety of the
North of Auckland, which would include the Gibbs far that
has these extraordinary works of art, it still looks very
different from anything that you would see anywhere in North
of Auckland, and that is because it is a large
statue of religious iconography today or say, they wouldn't care
(04:15):
if it was a statue of Christ or a Canoo
figure or whatever religion it might be. It's this thing
that is sticking out like the proverbial on top of
a tall hill that's going to be gold. It will
shine in the sun where the sun comes up in
the morning, and they just don't want it.
Speaker 5 (04:36):
The size is just it's monstrous for a valley like this.
It's going to be very visible from all the properties
around here. It's going to be bright gold, which just
doesn't make sense in a rural environment. It's a faithful
replication of apparently an image of gurum Posh. To my mind,
(04:58):
that describes a religious and dormant it doesn't describe art,
and so.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
This didn't need to be approved because it counts as
a work of art. Is that right?
Speaker 5 (05:11):
That's right?
Speaker 4 (05:11):
And this is a really this is a really interesting
thing about this Auckland Council process and about the approval
process for this Buddhist statue. When the application was put
in by the Jettis Grove Charitable Trust to build the statue,
they described it as a work of art and it
it led it to neighbors. They have said it was designed,
(05:31):
it was crafted by a Taiwanese artist and they say
it is a work of art. So under the Auckland
Council Unitary Plan, which is Auckland Council's wolves for building
in the wider Auckland area, if something is designated as
a work of art, it isn't a rural area. You
don't need to go through the resource consent process. You
(05:52):
go through a completely different process at all, where you
don't need to consult with your neighbors. You can just
go ahead and you can build it.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
Do you reckon that's a bit of a loophole in
the law.
Speaker 4 (06:02):
Well, the neighbors certainly think it's a loophole. And you know,
I talked to some ferociously clever academics that have spent
their life working in art and studying art, and the
outcome of those conversations was basically artist in the eye
of the beholder. What might be art to me might
not be art to you. There are precedent cases in
(06:24):
New Zealand of things that one might not see it
as art being described as art. There was a shipping
container in Hamilton that had a door in the side
and a window around the other side that was found
to be a piece of art because it was commentary
on housing and New Zealand. One of those academics that
I spoke to, he had said, the problem here isn't
(06:47):
that this is art or this isn't art. The problem
here is the Auckland Council decision making process. Because you
can call it anything art and it will be to
someone and so you can build anything you like.
Speaker 2 (06:59):
Thanks for joining us, David, Thanks very much. We're now
joined by Associate professor from Massi University's Resource and Environmental
Planning program, Caroline Miller. Can you just outline for us
(07:26):
the standard planning process for councils in New Zealand, if.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
That be sics right planning one on one? If you
want to do something on your property, then you one
of the first things you need to do is to
check your district and regional plans. So we're presuming it
might be in a rural environment or in an open one,
but you have eased the district plan, and the district
plan will list a series of activities as the Act
(07:54):
calls them, So that could be housing, it could be retail,
could be some industrial activity. Having defined what these different
activities are, then you determine what type of controls might
be needed to ensure that they fit into the environment
in which they're established and that they don't cause a
(08:15):
huge array of negative impacts for the people around them.
So essentially, what planning does says, here's your opportunity to
put forward what you want to do. In many cases,
it's what we call a permitted activity. So there are
some standards in the plan which you have to meet.
So in a housing situation, you may have to be
(08:38):
so many meters off a boundary, there'll be a restriction
on how high you can go to ensure there's an overshadowing, etc.
The activity could be quite complicated. So if we look
at a couple of these things that we've recently seen
they have looked at things like helicopter landing pads, probably
(08:59):
be on their experience of existing ones in urban and
rural areas, and then they would define the activity or
a landing pound for a helicopter and then decide what
level of controls you need to ensure that it doesn't
have significant adverse effects on surrounding properties and the people
(09:24):
who lived there.
Speaker 2 (09:25):
That's the helipad in Westmere that Anna Moobray and Ali
Williams have been fighting over. This has been obviously a
contentious process for some time, and that got approved just
the other week against the wishes of the community, and
it's led to some locals to say that they've lost
faith in the resource management process.
Speaker 3 (09:45):
Do you think that's fair?
Speaker 1 (09:46):
No, I don't think it is at all, Because they
have all benefited from the resource management process, they perhaps
don't recognize that at the most basic level, we've ensured
that nobody is going to build a large, noisy, dirty
factory next, because you've separated our activities and gathered to
(10:08):
ones together that are largely compatible with each other. So
in a residential area, they'll be provisioned for school, childcare centers,
sorts of things which fit into a residential zone. What
you do then get are a whole lot of activities
which might be acceptable or can be made acceptable in
(10:29):
terms of controlling anverse effects. But you need to examine
them on a one by one beast and that is
clearly where you have got. These helipads being seen to
be some dispute on this are restricted or a discretionary activity?
Speaker 6 (10:50):
Yeah, copses by residents in Auckland are pushing back against
a new helicopter pad Zuru co founder Animobra and Habbi
Ali Williams have applied to build one on their property.
Neighbors fear it may cause harm to local birds. I
just think Ali Williams is hoping that if he builds
a helicopter pad, maybe maybe Richie McCall will finally come
and visit. Do you think he calls it an allicopter?
Speaker 3 (11:15):
Oh my god, how the whole thing came.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
He doesn't want a helipair, He was like, I want
to build an alli pad. Is it enough for a
community to simply not like something, for counsel to have
to change its mind when it comes to consenting all
different kinds of plans.
Speaker 1 (11:37):
No, the act says you must demonstrate that you are
adversely affected, and that is harder perhaps than people think. Look,
this particular decision is a real matter of judgment and
I would be surprised if it doesn't go to appeal
(11:59):
because I think that this is one of perhaps it's
just a small number of people seeking helipads in established
residential area. I know there's a lot on y Heki,
but you can see, well, that is a very mixed area.
It's not densely urban, it's partly rural, partly rural residential, etc.
(12:21):
So you might expect things like helicopters in that environment.
All that the evidence that they have been presented. However,
that doesn't mean that they may be overalled by a
higher authority. And that's what the Environment Court exists for
so that people can say, we're not happy with this decision,
(12:43):
we believe is defective in the following ways, we want
the Environment Court to consider it. And in New Zealands
our system is very often in terms of giving people
the right to make comment on these sorts of development
and also give them a path to a higher level
of appeal. It's not actually a standard point of every
(13:06):
other planning system. Across the world. We have always had
a very generous system in that regard. However, in the end,
from my experience, some people will never be happy.
Speaker 2 (13:18):
What about when it comes to a sixteen meter tall
Buddha statue in why We're the Valley right now?
Speaker 1 (13:25):
That is an interesting one, definitely a one off. However,
as the cancel has pointed out, the plan has a
new definition of what is art, because remember, art is
in the eye of the beholder. I couldn't imagine you
being able to easily write a definition of what is art.
For the people who are erecting it, this is a
(13:46):
symbol of their faith. So in many ways, if you
think about it, cathedrals have great height and steeples, etc.
Because they are again indications of faith. In this case,
it's going to be put into a rural residential area
where essentially there's just brassland around it, on undulating land.
(14:09):
It will be prominent, but because the activity has not
been defined, there will be nothing in the plan that
controls it. Yes, it will be a prominent structure, but
I think that is the whole point. These people want
this as a signal of their faith.
Speaker 2 (14:29):
Do you think that from now it gives credence to
the fact that perhaps something like that should be in
future plans.
Speaker 1 (14:35):
Yes, yes, it might be. But remember when you sit
down and write a district plan, and have done this myself,
you have got to try and look at what is
in the world in front of you and what might
be in the world ten years ahead. So you're trying
to predict the future. So yes, the district plan would
have had to have contemplated that, but there's no real
(14:59):
signal I think that this sort of thing was going
to emerge. So yes, sometimes district plans don't actually contemplate
activity because remember, plans take a long time to go
through the processes, partly because we allow a lot of
consultation and submission, right and so, but the time a
(15:20):
plan comes into operation, it's already a number of views,
all in terms of the environment of whatever you want
to call it that it's based on. Yeah, but again,
how do you write a definition of art and what
is acceptable to me might not be acceptable to you.
But also, this is a rural residential area and there
(15:43):
will be a lot of other toll structures could come
into that environment. Wind power turbines come to mind, and
our hells are decorated with them. You can't stand anywhere
in the city of palmstanth No and not see your
wind turbine.
Speaker 3 (15:56):
If I wanted to build a wind turbine, say in
the middle of Palmerston North, and the council said no,
could I erect one anyway and call it art?
Speaker 1 (16:05):
I date it. I date it because there will be
a definition of a wind turbine in the district plan
and what you're proposing to do is covered by it.
Speaker 3 (16:16):
What if I bidazzle it, I.
Speaker 1 (16:17):
Know it won't make any difference in essence of it. Look,
you can, and you could properly find a kese where
you could do something, But for instance, in a residential area,
generally there are hype restrictions. Yeah, I can see. I
can see both sides of this. I can see why
the neighbors are very upset, and I can see why
(16:37):
of the people promoting it want to do it.
Speaker 3 (16:40):
How do planners balance competing interests?
Speaker 2 (16:44):
I guess, like economic development, you've got environmental protection and
community needs and want How do they balance all of
that in their decision making?
Speaker 3 (16:52):
Is it basically based on precedents to some extent?
Speaker 1 (16:56):
But remember planners don't make decisions. They present evidence with
a recommendation, but that recommendation can and is ignored because
the decision makers see that situation in a different way
what the plant does as they see. The first thing
(17:17):
you look at is what are the effects, who are
they going to affect, and what can we do to mitigate,
to reduce or even eliminate that effect. So, for instance,
if you wanted to build a particular building see a
small avatar in the rural area, people might not want
(17:37):
to see that. Therefore, one way of addressing the visual
impact of that on the neighbors would be to have
planting around it, to have it well set off boundaries
with the neighbors, etc. However, people sometimes don't care if
there are conditions that are going to mitigate, reduce, or
(18:01):
eliminate the effect because they don't believe that will actually
happen and it can't be demonstrated. Unfortunately, until the activity
takes place gets developed, there are at times unexpected effects
that neither the applicant nor the decision makers have actually predicted.
(18:24):
But in most cases, at the moment that artwork will
look like a visual assault to everybody who can see it,
because they are very focused on it and they don't like.
With time, my prediction would be that people will eventually
incorporate it into their view of the environment in which
(18:46):
they live.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
Thanks for joining us, Caroline.
Speaker 2 (18:52):
That's it for this episode of The Front Page. You
can read more about today's stories and extensive news coverage
at ends at harold co dot nz. The Front Page
is produced by Ethan Sills and Richard Martin, who is
also a sound engineer.
Speaker 3 (19:08):
I'm Chelsea Daniels.
Speaker 2 (19:10):
Subscribe to the Front Page on iHeartRadio or wherever you
get your podcasts, and tune in tomorrow for another look
behind the headlines.
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