54 James Beban from Urban Edge Planning

An action-packed interview with James Beban, Co-Owner Urban Edge Planning.

James advises where NOT to build, as an expert in natural hazard policy formation and research.

The multi-disciplinary Urban Edge team describe ‘quality’ as their core principle across all aspects of the firm; Resource Consent Planning / Landscape Architecture and Urban Design / District Plan Policy and Private Plan Changes / Natural Hazard Policy Formation and Research.

They have a team of Planners, Landscape Architects and Urban Designers.

Their services also include strategic policy advice for local and central government; evidence for council and Environmental Court hearings; Stakeholder and Community consultation.’ 

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:09):
Hi, this is Roslin's Derby here for Local Architecture now
for and we have James Beban in the studio.

Speaker 2 (00:16):
Hi, James, Hi, thank you for having me.

Speaker 1 (00:18):
You're welcome and you've come from Lower Heart.

Speaker 2 (00:21):
Yes, yes, I've traveled up today.

Speaker 1 (00:22):
Yeah, and you have a business, a director founder of
Urban Edge Planning, which is understand people realize a sort
of like resource consent planning, planning, district plans, and.

Speaker 2 (00:35):
Yeah, we're a landscape we're a planning, landscape, architecture and
urban design groups. So we kind of do all things
around kind of the resource consent side and the resource
management side, from the policy work through the consents. But
then also as we're doing more intensification of housing, we've
realized there is a need for better designs and better
outcomes as we push our density. So that's why we
now have an urban design team on board. And then

(00:55):
that's what's as naturally complemented by that as having a
landscape architecture team on board as well to help designed
the spaces around the houses that we now live in.

Speaker 1 (01:02):
Sounds wonderful. So you've got the urban design expertise and
the landscape Because I was looking at some of your
landscape shots galleries, and they're very textural, they're very kind
of of place, just as a sort of passing look
at the websites. That's really nice.

Speaker 2 (01:15):
Yeah, yeah. Our we were founded and we found it
about eight years ago, and we found it out of
a position if we wanted to do quality, So if
you had a mission statement or a mission you know,
company logo or slogan ours, it's just simply quality and
it's always ever been and it's been quality in all spaces.
Quality projects, quality work life balance, quality officers, quality staff,
quality everything. And when we took on the landscape architecture,

(01:37):
we took it on because we were actually disappointed with
some of the quality of the landscape architecture we saw
coming through in multi units. And we've always been you
can sit on the side of the sit on the
sidelines and be part of the problem and just complain
all you can actually put your hand in the ring
and try to make something better of it. So we
made a decision to bring landscape architecture into house so
we could actually start controlling the quality of the spaces
we had around the development. And we were involved in

(01:59):
m which means.

Speaker 1 (02:01):
That from a proflam you're working with some multi density,
medium density, multi dwelling work as well as one off.

Speaker 2 (02:11):
Yeah, yes, So we do everything from two lots, subdivisions
or some additions and alterations that might have a technical
rule trigger throw to up to seventy to one hundred
houses at a time. So we work through the whole
scale of projects. Most of the most you know, if
you'd probably say seventy percent of it's in a kind
of two to ten dwelling range is probably the where
the bulk of them sits.

Speaker 1 (02:32):
But you find that you've actually got able to influence
and produce, develop and provide good landscaping, awareness and final
design for these multi density.

Speaker 2 (02:44):
Yes, we do. And it's always a challenged because it
comes down to cost and benefits and everything like that
has to develop a user and in the current market
it's quite a challenge. House prices a bit depressed, land
prices are still relatively high, and a lot of costs
have gone up, and there's still a posh to try
to scale back the landscaping we're finding in the current market,
but we still put our foot forward and try to
get better outcomes and what you would otherwise get And

(03:04):
do you get.

Speaker 1 (03:04):
A new sense of response from the tenants or owners
or inhabitants of you.

Speaker 2 (03:09):
No, it's a surprising you area and it's something we've
been talking about recently, like going back and kind of
reviewing and interviewing on previous projects around how have they gone?
How do people find the spaces they're living in. We've
certainly seen ones you've driven past in the street and
we've stopped and gone, oh, yeah that works well, that
didn't work well, you know what. We can learn from that,
but we don't ever get much of an opportunity to

(03:30):
get back into the final product once it's been built,
and it's something we're looking to take up a bit
more worth the developers so we can actually see how
the spaces are responding, especially in the light of the
push for intensification that's coming through.

Speaker 1 (03:41):
Right which is lot we'll talk about for sure. But
when you drive past your finished works, do you, as
an expert get a sense, yes, that's working and you'll
feel good about that.

Speaker 2 (03:50):
Yeah, yeah, there certainly there's ones you go, oh, yep,
that's worked well. There's ones you know they've come out good.
There's push and you could drive fast you go, oh, oh,
that's not quite what I thought it would be. But
we learn more from sometimes your mistakes and do for
your successes, and it could just be sometimes the things
that haven't worked is your sense of space in terms
of how it might have worked. It's a little bit

(04:11):
different to what you know because youre always looking at
two dimensional plans versus what a three dimensional form comes
out like. And it's sometimes it's just in the small
spaces in terms of how the spaces are working together
or coming together. But more often than not, you know,
we're very happy with what's coming out, But every now
and then you do go past something and go, oh,
it could have been tweaked a little bit. But sometimes
also some of those things that are of it's a
disappointing outcome is because a change happened after we were

(04:33):
our involvement and we're like, oh, well, we had no
influence on that. There's nothing we could do about that.

Speaker 1 (04:38):
Yeah, things change. Things happen then later on down the
design because you have design with intention from understanding the
whole big picture and how it comes down to the detail,
and there's outside influencers change that they don't understand the
context from which the design arrived.

Speaker 2 (04:55):
No very true, and we often don't get consulted on
those changes and they just happened that's the end product unfortunately. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (05:03):
So do your urban design team have influence in terms
of like that three dimensional design understanding.

Speaker 2 (05:09):
Yes, Yeah, they do a lot of work with you know,
in terms of orientation of housing, overlooking privacy, sense of
addressed to street, how it responds to the street. Very heavily
involved in that space, articulation and modulation of the building form,
all that kind of space. They get heavily involved and
they work quite hard in its space where we're a
little bit unique as a lot of our urban designers

(05:31):
also peer review for council, so we work on the
council side as well as for the applicants, so we
get a very good understanding of what council requirements are,
what are their hot issues that play at any given time,
and we can use that knowledge to help also inform
developments to make sure they have a smoother path through
the consenting process.

Speaker 1 (05:48):
Sure, so your urban designers would be just basically commenting
on what the developers have provided and as a sort
of like a review thing or how would you get
how would you be involved in design or are you not.

Speaker 2 (06:00):
Yeah. So the very first thing we usually say to
if it's a private project we were putting application in.
The very first thing we say to developers is before
you put pen and paper, have a chat to us.
So let's start off on the right forard rather than
getting too detailed working out plans that don't work. So
let's have a conversation right at the beginning. We'll outline
some parameters that you must hit, and then we'll go
from there. Then we say, well, do some initial sketches,

(06:23):
don't invest too much time. We'll review them, will provide feedback,
and we try to provide the iterative comment on terms
of the outcomes they need to hit. All the way through,
let's done in consultation with the planner that's also involved,
because urban design changes may influence planning changes, and so
it's important that they go hand in hand together. You
don't want to fight each other. And then hopefully by
the time the final plan sets developed, it's just a
case of writing the reporter and it goes so.

Speaker 1 (06:44):
As your website say, it is quite a unique position
because what we find with developers is that they'll have
this idea and they bring the architects in after the
whole kind of resource consenting has been done, Like the
architects are kind of plugged in, and you don't necessarily
have any sort of control over the urban you know,
whereas a few are they're influencing at that resource consent

(07:05):
planning stage or that public space and urban space is critical.
It's a unique position to be in.

Speaker 2 (07:14):
It is it is, and it's a it's a position
that has required a lot of educating. It hasn't necessarily
been appreciated by the development market. And for that urban
design had a role because in the context of planning,
planning in the ROMA form has been around since nineteen
ninety one, but urban designers, I mean, I've been planning
for twenty years and they've only rarely been around for
the last ten to twelve years. So it's quite a

(07:36):
new discipline in the context of planning. So we board
and you know, we were using urban design from our inception,
you know, seven eight years ago, and so from the
very early stages it was quite hard to convince the
value of to the developer, what is an urban designer.
Now it's accepted without question, because if you don't have
an urban designer kind of on board for many of
your multi units with an urban design assessment and design

(07:58):
statement to go with it showing how it met or
the district Plant Design Guide requirements and giving those outcomes,
then the consent is going to struggle more through the process.

Speaker 1 (08:06):
Okay, so they realize, so there is now like a
potential urban design panel review within whatever council that may
review their work. But if they've involved you at the start,
then all a lot of those questions are put forward
at the start.

Speaker 2 (08:21):
Yeah, yeah, very much so. So most times when you
submit an application to council, even our urban designers, they
submit it or be peer reviewed by another urban designer
to see if they agree with the outcomes and everything
like that, and then if changes and tweaks are needed.
And that's what any council in the Willington region you just,
you know, you submit an application and or get peer reviewed.
And that's why our urban designers sit in with council,
because they peer review other people's applications that come in.

(08:43):
So you end up inevitably sitting on both sides of
the fence.

Speaker 1 (08:47):
I didn't realize there was so much urban design practice
actually in play these days. I mean, I find it
most people don't even know what urban designers, So I
understand how your developers took a while to understand it.

Speaker 2 (09:00):
Yeah, yeah, and it's getting It's certainly been a like
I said, it's been a learning exercise for the development
community over time. It's I think it's still seen as
a little bit of our at times thorn in the side.
But as we push density and if we push our
intensification profile, we need good spaces for people to live in,
and the way you achieve that is through good urban

(09:22):
design outcomes. There's no point creating units that never gets sunlight,
or outdoor living that has no amenity, or streets that
are dominated by blank facades and no sense of address
that doesn't give any victories to either the tenants or
the owners or the public. So it's something over time
which has had to work through and all that where
the challenge still very much sits in this space is

(09:44):
the need for there's still a real push for that
balance between car parking and how many on site car
parking spaces you provide versus urban design outcomes. And even
only now in the one intent region there's no requirement
to provide on site parking, those rules have dropped away
a couple of years ago. There's now a value on
a car park. And because there's a value on a
car park, and because he's not necessarily the public transport

(10:07):
infrastructure to support no car parking to the degree we need,
it's still a real push to put in one to
parking spaces per residential unit. But that leads to very
vecular dominated developments, which are not a great urban design outcome,
and often people sometimes trading yield for car parking spaces.
So that's a big area we're finding out at the
moment where the tension really exists. What's your parking versus

(10:31):
development design ratio?

Speaker 1 (10:33):
Right, because yield is the key thing as well, but
based on yield in terms of your developers understanding the
importance of urban design within the planning. Are they doing
it purely because it's convenient so that they can pass
their external urban design review people, or they're doing it

(10:53):
because they believe it's Are they doing it because they
know they have to tick that box, or they're doing
it because they can afford to within there yield expectations.

Speaker 2 (11:02):
It's like anything to continue on. There's some they're doing
that so they can take the box. There are some
that are genuinely wanting to take on feedback for good
design outcomes and because they're genuinely passionate about it. And
you have developers on the entire spectrum sitting near the
even within that spectrum, not even in across the whole spectrum,
the car parking the show is still features predominantly because

(11:26):
of the value that's now assigned to a car parking space.
And I think in heart par it's something like fifty
thousand dollars as assigned to a car parking space for
you know, ten thousand dollars a concrete you get a
very good return on it. And if you have someone's
got a choice between a house with a car park
or a house without a car park, even if there's
a price differential, people still desire the house with the
car park for the simple reason or the convenience in

(11:47):
the way we still live and everything like that. And
so that's and it's attention that probably weren't really unwind
until we've got better product transport infrastructure in play and
there is more ability to move around our cities free
without the need for vehicle. And while we can do
that now, it's not necessarily as convenient as we need

(12:08):
it to be.

Speaker 1 (12:08):
Which is where urban design comes and has been very
important in the long term future that we get those
public spaces that people actually benefit from walking through. At
the moment, they just want to get from A to
B for obvious reasons. So you're saying that developers owners
can sacrifice yield, which is properties per properties, how much
they're going to make out of it for providing less yield,

(12:33):
but providing car parkings because the money is in the
being able to sell the car park space.

Speaker 2 (12:38):
Soon. Quite a few developments that have kind of wound back.
They might have got to approval originally for six or
seven residential units and they have wound them back to
maybe four instead, but the four have got car parking
where the six or seven did not, because there's more
money and having the car parking than then what there
is and not having it. So it's still a real
tension that exists out there, and it's certainly attention we
feel every day. It's just working through the finding that

(13:03):
finding that sweet spot balance that will work for all parties.

Speaker 1 (13:08):
So yes, we can definitely get onto the current issues
with the medium density housing rules and how obviously you're
very aware of that what's happening in the landscape out there.
But generally you're just as an overview for practice what
you've got a sort of a list of services and
what you're about. So you're doing resource planning, you're doing
plan what's the general overview.

Speaker 2 (13:30):
So we kind of when we describe ASA interviewing something,
we normally say we've got kind of four or five arms.
So we've got what it's called our resource concent arm,
which is our applications processing for counsels. You know, we
do a bit of that on the side. Kind of
what would say is getting approval for something or giving
approvals for listeners.

Speaker 1 (13:49):
That means planning is not building consent. Planning is getting
the building so that it meets all the district plan requirements,
which are different for different councils.

Speaker 2 (13:56):
It is very different. They're getting more standardized, but yeah,
they're still very very different. So we do a lot
in that space. That's a big thing. We do district
plane policy formation, so that is the rule book, so
what rules does the development need to meet and how
do those know how you meet those rules? So we
do a lot of work of that around the country.

(14:17):
We tend to specialize in the natural hazards and natural
environment spaces in that one. So and we do a
lot in that space. We do. We have that urban
design and landscape architecture which we have touched on and
do plenty in that space. And then what we have
is we're unique in that we have a natural Hazards
policy or what we call it natural Hazards Research, where

(14:38):
we do quite a bit of work alongside the likes
of EQUC or GNS science or with the councils developing
best practice for lendues planning around natural hazards. And that
could be anything from non statuary national guidance that could
be through to doing research to how do we how
should plan and respond to a certain natural hazard. It

(15:00):
could be right in the rules or some draft rules
or policy around what it could look like, doing submissions
on national direction and things like that. So we do
a lot of dollar of work in this space around
natural acids as well.

Speaker 1 (15:13):
So you're acting as consultants to various local authority and
national level policy makers as to how is to develop
policy and guides and regulation around hasn't planning?

Speaker 2 (15:26):
Yes, that's correct, Yeah, So we do we have quite
a m there's two to three of us that's been
time in that space pretty much full time in that space.
And then another one of our planners as we're both
ex gene Science, so we're helping out and all worked
out in the social science research team that Genie Science
has and then we've come on from that and we've
enjoyed the work. And because we have the planning practice

(15:49):
and understanding how districting policy and regional policy and national policy,
and there's always so many policies and planning, how they
all come together the former story and then how it
gets implemented on the ground level. Because we have that
unique understanding through we then tend to work with a
lot of these agencies breath feeding in that knowledge in
terms of also our natural hazards knowledge, and then how

(16:10):
you pull it together and make sure it works.

Speaker 1 (16:11):
So you're talking about a story. You understand the policy,
you understand the detail of these different district plans, but
you think of it as story. So it's relating to
the circumstances that we have in terms of climate or whatever,
and then that's actually producing impact on buildings and sort
of development and all sorts. But that comes down to
understanding how to implement policy and advise on policy.

Speaker 2 (16:33):
And we've been historically as a country, we've been terrible
in natural air of space. Like I always say, say
someone like Petnia, I call it a venture living, Like
there are so many natural hazards down there. You are
every day down there, you're doing well because there's so
many overlapping hazards and you know, you know, it's only
a matter of time. And we've got lots and lots
of places like that around the country where historical development

(16:54):
patterns have gone on. We've built our cities in our
environments in those places. If we had knowledge that we
had today, we wouldn't build there. And so where we've
come in and we're a little bit unique, is we've
started developing frameworks where you can say no, So no
more development is not okay to develop here. The risk
of life is too great, the risk of property is
too great. And traditionally under the RMA, we haven't been

(17:16):
too good at saying no. We've always said yes. And
I think it's someone like ninety eight point six or
ninety nine percent of all applications you ever get approved
that go through the resource consent process. It's a very,
very high percentage. But from a hazard profile perspective we've
developed in the areas, it includes some areas quite recently
where we show is just the risk of life or
risk of property is just very very significant, and shortly

(17:38):
it's going to be a risk to well being because
we're going to see insurance retreat and once you have
insurance retreat, you're not going to make get mortgages. Banks
are going to call mortgages in and that's going to
have real implications. So we can't While while planning can't
necessarily undo the legacies of the past, it can prevent
the legacies of the future coming to fruition and so
we've been very heavily involved in that space.

Speaker 1 (17:58):
So to actually be able to advise, you know the
potential that authorities can say no, you have to have
very deep research and very background research to know what
that story is from end to end YEP.

Speaker 2 (18:09):
And that's one of the big barriers to planning for
natural hazards is the financial challenge. That research is very
very expensive. It can run into the hundreds of thousands
of dollars for some specialist research that you need to get,
so there's always a limitation to what you can do
and I always say the councilors you can't plan for
every hazard. There's no point trying to do that. Pick

(18:30):
your top three or pick your top four, because that's
going to get ninety percent of your problem. And if
you're dealing with ninety percent problem, well that's better than
dealing with none of it. So most councilors generally have
to prioritize where their natural hazard research is going to go.
But then we've had things like in the Wellington Region
probably about it must be about ten years ago, the

(18:51):
regional Council developed a natural hazard strategy for the region
and the whole idea was to be having consistent approach
to hazards and consistent research and how we do it
in the in the region. And that's god at a
very consistent approach across in terms of our frameworks we
now have and I think Capity is the only outlier simply,
and that's only simply because there's no criticism of Capity Council.

(19:15):
They're just gone through their own process with their coastalstal
Hazard coastal hazard process with all the committee meetings and
everything like that, which has been a very important process
for them. They're just getting any flood hazard and modeling updated,
and I imagine in time they will also have a
very similar framework to what we already see and play
now in Wellington, Lower Heart and.

Speaker 1 (19:35):
Other hut because when we do resource consents, I often
do my own ones. Actually we have to look at
the cavity in terms of flooding ponding and also the
Greater Wellington one to combine it. But everyone in capity
is aware of our coastal you know, that's something that
everyone has been aware of, and it's you know, it's
a whole kind of like real estate value thing that
is in the public mind. But then also we're aware

(19:58):
of I would have thought that our flood I understood
that our flood mapping was pretty good. Is it still
being updated?

Speaker 2 (20:04):
Yeah? Yeah, it's going through a renewal process right at
the very moment, and I think it's due to be
finished this year. I don't quite beyond that, but it's
going through a renewal process to include updated climate change predictions. Okay,
So as time has gone on, a lot of historical
mapping has not included climate change, and that's been an
issue in every council or across the region and then

(20:25):
over time as new mapping come in. We've seen you know,
for for example, Hot Valley, the historical mapping didn't have
any sea level rise assumptions or any climate change increased
rainfall assumptions. We're now going for one point five to
nine meters of sea level rise and a I think
I believe it's a twenty percent increase in rainfall intensity.

(20:47):
So those have quite bad implications. Then on your flood
has it maps? And what then looks like?

Speaker 1 (20:52):
Gosh, because our flood has it maps we thought some
years ago and you know we're pretty current, but now
they're constantly being revid So your capacity isn't this sort
of advisory policy role and must have a whole lot
more focus and sort of relevant. What must be even
more relevant in the recent climate events that we've had

(21:14):
in Auckland and the East coast, would that be right?

Speaker 2 (21:16):
Yeah, they've been interesting those as climate events. They they
had a big impact for a short period of time,
is how I would describe them. Everyone was talking about
them for a couple of months and then cost of living,
change of government changing government policy, council rates increases. Do

(21:37):
those conversations now have kind of overtaken the hazard profile
conversation of just a year ago, and when you're talking
about natural hazard research being very, very expensive, we're seeing
in councils starting to drop some of that stuff now.
So an example that was Polaris City Council. They did
a probably would almost be nationally leading appro to look

(22:00):
at some kind of managed retreat policy and they had
it in their long term plan and they had a
budget funded for it, and that was from a long
term plan. About three years ago, the proposings drop that
funding and this long term plan now simply to try
to manage rates increases and everything like that. So what
was potentially nationally leading program is going to drop away
because it's now been seen in the tension of everything

(22:21):
is potentially nice to have until something more comes down,
until we get more national direction in the space. So
they've dropped it off to try to reduce the impact
of rates increases. So it's really interesting watching that tension
play out at the moment and we're seeing more of it,
and I don't think it's fully grasped at a local

(22:46):
level and probably definitely at an individual level about how important
it is the plan for natural headers, especially from an
insurance perspective. The insurance industry is what they look at
district plans, that they get down to that level of
detail to how are you managing hazards to be able
to determine risk and to termine our term and what
your premiums will be charged or whether they will ensure

(23:08):
you what expects.

Speaker 1 (23:09):
Do they have to look at all that?

Speaker 2 (23:10):
Oh, they have they specialize in usk. There is no
industry that probably understands risk better than the insurance How do.

Speaker 1 (23:17):
They get into the district plan? Do they have people
like you to advice they know?

Speaker 2 (23:20):
I don't. I don't know exactly how they do. They
have their own policy analysts or whoever is doing it,
but they are looking at that level of information. And
they've made it very clear through a lot of statements
in the media and everything like that, that we have
to change our the way we plan financial hazards, like
we can't have the Aucklands and the Gabriels of the
world occurring every other year that is not financially visible.

(23:44):
I mean, once insured, it hurt an insurance represented to
say they don't they don't ensure a certainty. They insurance uncertainty.
So if there's going to be a certain event. Then
they're not interested in ensuring that because that's not what
their market is. It's only the uncertainty they're interested in.
So and that's why we saw the draft Natural Hazard
Policy Statement come out to give national direction around how

(24:07):
to plan and manage natural hazards, and that came out
towards the end of last year, just before the elections,
and I understand that that's still being worked on. I
don't know what formal where it's at or what is
happening with it, but there is some you know, that
was largely in response to the insurance industry saying enough,

(24:28):
it's enough, you've got to do You've got to do
something better about this. But it's an immensely complex issue
because there's emotions tied up to it. There's property values
tied up into it, or perceived property values. The research
suggests that hazard olines don't affect property values, but people
have to perceived view of it. Or as soon as

(24:49):
you put a line on the paper, the insurance council
will know about it, or they do the own natural
hazard research, so they already know what they're dealing with.
So all these kind of emotions come into it, and
you're often playing around people's largest they set there at
their house based So what we tend to find is
a large part of it is the communication of the
science to the people and bringing them on the journey

(25:10):
around what does this actually mean. People get a misunderstanding.
You know, you're going to take my house away from me,
You're going to take my property, You're not going to
allow me to paint my house. Ever. Again, they get
a real misconception around what it is, and that's not
necessarily always the case. It's you can never take away
someone's house, or you can never take away someone's property,
but you can say to them, no, we're not letting

(25:30):
you put a second property on the back or put
it on leaving you subdividing. Yes, we are taking away
these rights. But the reason being, if we put someone there,
there's a good chance in a hundred years time that
whoever's living there will either they have to have their
house demolished or you know, there could be a fatality
depending on the hazard involved. Are you okay with that
on your conscious? Is that something? Is that an outcome

(25:51):
you'll are striving to achieve, notine numbercent the time. People
just don't understand that you know we are we are
talking about fatalities and we are talking about potential full
demolition of health and.

Speaker 1 (26:02):
So who communicates that.

Speaker 2 (26:03):
We get involved in a lot of those communications.

Speaker 1 (26:05):
At community public, community consultation.

Speaker 2 (26:08):
The community consultation level.

Speaker 1 (26:10):
So there'tle skill and how you do that considering the
emotions involved in the finance involved.

Speaker 2 (26:14):
You just gotta be thick skinned.

Speaker 1 (26:16):
Thick skinned.

Speaker 2 (26:16):
Yeah, to a third industry.

Speaker 1 (26:17):
You provide sort of how you provide systems to local
authorities as to how they can communicate these critical issues and.

Speaker 2 (26:24):
Be actively involved in them as well. Okay, and we
do a lot of conversations with politicians well, a lot
of education for them at the local government level. You know,
this is what the hazards is, this is what it means,
this is what we're doing, and this is the reasons why,
this is the implications if we don't And and you know,
there's an assumption out there and those of us that
work in the hazard space that everyone understands hazards. And

(26:46):
it's an easy assumption to make when you know something,
you just assumed everyone knows everything you know, and you know,
conversations I've dealt with as you know, you know, even
quite recently, I saw something in a paper from one
council that sea level rise is not real. It's just
a hypothesis that has yet to be proven. I've had
a council large genuinely asked me if they could move

(27:07):
the Wellington fault line because it's inconvenient for them, and
they thought it was something that you could relocate. Like,
there's a real lack of understanding around even the mechanics
of hazards and how they work. And you know, something
like earthquakes. You know, if we say an earthquake has
a recurrence in devolved once of every tooth less than

(27:28):
every two thousand years, we say that's a highly active
fault and you should not build on those. And Wellington
faults an example, that Alpine faults another example. But then
I've had, you know, politicians or counselors try to understand, well,
why are we're planning for something that hasn't happened since
before the birth of Christ. You know, we're talking to
two thousand year time frame, you know, why are we
even worried about that? But the reality is the short

(27:49):
sharp impacts and when they happen, fatalities and their impacts
on the economy, as we've seen from christ It's an example,
are significant.

Speaker 1 (27:59):
So you're saying that, well, the district planning and councils
are focusing on doing the work that's required around flood hazards,
there's another whole work that's been done by insurances which
are over it completely. They were all over this thing
and deeply into it. And so when people just respond
and kind of concern to what the local authorities are

(28:20):
telling them, you know, really the insurance are really just
a stronger kind of background to the whole thing, which people,
I guess can't really complain about.

Speaker 2 (28:31):
Well, you know, well people complain about insurance and they say,
you know, they're just getting you know, greedy, or they're rich,
or they're just trying and to take money of us.
New Zealand's probably been underinsured for a number of years
in terms of its risk profile. You know, we have
a very significant risk profile across the country. You said
does vary, but the insurance market probably hasn't had the
full and understanding of that. And Christian Truthquake was probably

(28:53):
an opening eye opening to them. And I was at
a conference and at the time it was assumed the
CHRISTI at truthquake occurred on one fault, and an insurance
represent I've got up and asked an expert how many
unknown faults are there out there, like, well, there are
no one. We don't know how many no one faults
are out there, So you know, we get but I
think that was a real eye open into the industry. Then,

(29:13):
over time, as we've had Gabriel and the Auckland events,
and we've had the Nelson flood events, and we had
the Canterbury ones a couple of years ago, every one
of those events builds on the knowledge of the insurance
insurer out there and built on the knowledge republic and
everything like that, and they take that knowledge and they
start doing their more research and they start gathering their
own information, and then that just directly feeds into premiums

(29:36):
and there is you know, it is a very real
risk that in the next ten years we will see
insurance retreat from some areas because of the hazard profile
unless we start looking at lends planning measures to start
addressing that risk.

Speaker 1 (29:50):
So from there, then there's an overlap between you know,
we're trying to get this medium high which this medium
density housing was higher density, and then we're saying the
other side, we've got we're going to have to say no,
you can't have you can't build another house on your property,
which is what the current rules allow you to do
because of the hazard situation. So you've got overlaps of

(30:10):
different demographic and environmental conditions yeap.

Speaker 2 (30:13):
And that's probably where I have some criticism of the
National Policy Statement for Urban Development. It was it was
needed to drive some intensification because there were a lot
of councils that would not allow for intensification around the
urban centers. That it was needed, But it was a
metaphoric sledgehammer to crack a nut approach on this one,

(30:34):
because it also pushed density into places we probably should
not be pushing density and where, And I've always said
that in my view, the combination of the National Policy
Statement for Urban Development and the medium density residential standards
at the National and Labor Government agreed probably set Hasard
plenty back twenty years in my view, because it enabled

(30:55):
a whole lot of development in areas we didn't need.
So where that's where it's becoming really really important now
that the natural hazard overlays are having to come in
over the top of the areas we're up zoned for
development and start trumping them, and they need to be
more firmer in their direction and more firmer in their
frameworks to say in these areas no, or in these
areas maybe let's see how you go. You've got to

(31:17):
prove to us it's okay. Or in these areas, yes,
providing you do a B and C.

Speaker 1 (31:21):
But that's attention because I was amazed how quickly the developers.
The uptake on the developers when those medium density rules
came in. It was in six months that we're building
these three x three x threes on what was once
a single dwelling property. Didn't take them long to pick up,
and so there's been a lot of uptake on it.
So you're trying to catch up with that or.

Speaker 2 (31:43):
Yeah, well we're come in and over the top of them.
So we've just finished the hearings for Wellington City last
year and we've bought in conjunction with Volington's County and
we're involved in bringing some pretty strong restrictions in some
areas we were basically saying no more development. And then
there's some quite large areas of the city or the
region that we've said you know, these areas are subject

(32:05):
to be suitable for any more development. We're currently involved
in Hot City in the same area and again some
areas of the city we're saying no. And equally we've
just finished up a heart where we've just said some
areas of the city are just no more development, particularly
because of the Warlington fault. And end of the day, yes,
people are not they're happy or whatever and that, but

(32:25):
they've always got through the hearing framework because the legislation
is set to support them. Is now on the jobs
of the planners assessing them to say called the frameworks
there for us to say no, it's given us a
very strong direction to say no. Let's make sure we
do say that no. And but what interesting, what has
been really interesting is to be in the market response
to those overlays, because one of the things we get

(32:45):
is people ring ouselves all the time and say can
I I'm looking to buy this property, what can I
put on it? And that's a very common question to
get and would say, oh, look, you're in a you know,
you're in a high coastal inundation. Has it over like
I'm not not interested in that? And no, And I
was sing look, you can't develop it further, but you
don't even have to finish the sentence. Now, we're not
insurance interest in that. We don't want our brain tied

(33:05):
to that. So the market response is I've often been now.

Speaker 1 (33:08):
It's the developer side, not the private residence. No, he
wants to have a view of the sea, regardless of
the hazards.

Speaker 2 (33:14):
Yes, the developers are now saying in only foreshore for example,
relosting a lot of developments done into pull back from
that area because of the hazard profile and what it
means for them and everything like that, and not interested
in developing it. But equally, the advice we can equally
give to them is it's going to be really hard
to develop. You're not going to get through this. It's

(33:35):
the framework set up for no further development. And they're like,
oh yeah, we'll just go to swear. We don't want
that fight. So it's even an overlay and a plan
can drive a market response, just like the medium Density
Residential standard drove a market response to intensification. You put
an overlay in a plan that becomes a visual queue
to a developer, they can see it now, and that
drives the market response to move away. And that's not

(33:58):
a bad thing because there's plenty of plany your properties
that are not in significant hazard over dase that can
be developed, So there's no one should pushing development into
those areas. But I suspect over time we'll see a
very big pullback of development in the high hazard areas.

Speaker 1 (34:13):
Because that was my question. You're involved in providing planning
advice to these multi density projects, which is part of
your interest and expertise and where you're at, but then
you're also saying no. You're also on the other side
where you're saying no, you can't do any of this
multi density. So there's quite a bit of energy going
on in your practice in terms of the two different.

Speaker 2 (34:33):
Yeah, and we have a policy and our thing that
anything in a high hazard area, anything that's identified as
a high hazard area, we won't take a development in that.
We can't be sitting there right in the frameworks saying no,
you can't be developing in it. And then next se
can represent net development in an application stage. So to
reconcile that tension, we just don't take applications on in
that space and we just won't get involved in them.

Speaker 1 (34:53):
But you say there's still heaps of land where you
can do successful high density development. And do you feel
from a practitioner that higher density is the way forward
in many ways as a sort of quality urban design.

Speaker 2 (35:10):
Yes, yes, and no providing the high I'm still a
big believer that high density needs to be close to
main transport nodes and main and close to main commercial centers,
so where you're within walking distances and everything like that.
My concern is with particularly there. And if we say
and when I say high density, I tend to think
of apartments. So if I think of an apartment style development,

(35:32):
I'd rather see that closer to CBD, your main main
entrance route. If we're talking more a townhouse style developments
and more medium density, but we're still getting down to
one hundred and fifty to two hundred square meta lots.
I think we've gone too far with the medium density
residential standards because that's pretty much enabled right through most
cities now. So you could have medium density development occurring

(35:55):
a long way away and it has to be car centric.
It's not close to shops, it's not within a walkable distance,
is never going to be serviced by public transport, and
so that creates a real tension in terms of how
we develop. And I know there's a talk within the
national government space at the moment around pulling back the

(36:16):
medium density residential standards or from what I've seen councils
having to justify to why they're retaining them. I think
for councils like Lower Heart, Upper Heart to a degree,
Wellington City and even Pararua, they don't have a lot
of green field space to go, they are forced to
retain the medium density residential standards, but I'd like to

(36:37):
see them shrink in where they apply because I think
the very top upper reaches of Stokes Valley, where it's
in the middle of nowhere been our do Townhouns is
out there. It's probably overall not a great outcome because
it's going to always be carcentric. Conversely, beingle to push
it towards the CPD is is going to be a
better outcome. Kevity is a funny one and because Kepty

(37:02):
has an allowed intensification for quite some time, it's been
probably the more conservative council in terms of intensification. Over
the last ten to fifteen years. The medium density Standards
was important in terms of opening capity up a but
again I would like to see that probably restricted more
to around the main transport nodes and everything like that.
But Kepley may also have an opportunity for a little

(37:23):
bit of greenfield. And as much as greenfield has a
carcentric side to it as well, you can't take a
completely out of the equation, whereas Hut Valley it's got
no greenfield options, it's z outa space. It can only
go intensification. Really, So Kempany's probably a slightly unusual one,
but it is very interesting debate around where is right

(37:45):
and where it's not right. And I certainly have a
view that the medium density residential standards, while positive in
some ways, were very blunt in others and needed to
be scaled back a little bit.

Speaker 1 (37:56):
A very blunt instrument, but the developers did pick up
real quick and therefore the urban design outcomes may not
have been optimum.

Speaker 2 (38:04):
Oh no, I mean, and that's one of my criticisms
of them. And we even turned up to Select Committe.
It's the only time we turned up the Select Committee
was talking against some of the medium density residential standars,
because if you're doing three houses, you can have them
south facing outdoor living areas. You can have very poor
urban design outcomes from shading and overlooking. You can have
quite blank facades or nice sense of street dress. Going

(38:25):
back to those urban design principles we're putting towards, and
it wouldn't have been hard to improve the medium density
residential standards. There's only a few sentences here and there
and a few tweaks like we're never suggesting you need
to throw them out, but you could have tweeked them
that were still gave developers a lot more permissiveness in
terms of what they developed, but still get really good

(38:45):
outcomes in the return. And we didn't have to have
this trade off that you don't need to have this
trade off that you have poor outcomes and go to
you know, poor outcomes, but that's how you get houses
belt or god urban desig but houses will never be built.
But that is not a trade off. You can have both.

Speaker 1 (39:05):
So you're talking about capity, and we're all kind of
a little bit always got this angst that you know,
we've got this green field, so this is open slather.
There's a sort of like immense amount of land, but
you don't in the end get necessarily good outcomes because
there's so much land that they just put repetitive houses
on sections that get subdivided without any real density or

(39:27):
sense of kind of contained urban experience. And somehow we
need the likes of you guys advising as to how
Capiti does develop so that you know we've got available
land a little bit. But so what if you're just
going to can repeat cookie cut of houses down Northern
Northern North We're not. We're just spreading, but we're not

(39:49):
actually creating urban quality and.

Speaker 2 (39:52):
That's been a real potentially You've seen a lot of
bit down in the South Island's well around Selwyn and
everything like that as well. I think there needs to
be a bigger focus on getting the structure plans right
up front and not letting in too much variation from
the structure plans. And I think that's a space where
nationally we probably haven't done as well as we could do.

(40:13):
But then the other part of the puzzle that needs
to come in is kind of the financial progatives that
go with development as well, and that's always something that
sits out there, and a standalone house will always sell
easier than a townhouse, and a townhouse will always sell
easier than an apartment. So and then caught up all

(40:34):
that is, there's a lot of cost mechanisms associative. So
you go over four stories is you'll probably be where
the construction methodology changes quite significantly and the cost go up.
So if you're going to do four stories, yet you
need to do probably six or seven to make it
cost effective. But then the designing provisions allow you to
do that kind of intensification. What are your council fees
on it? Recently in the heart where we're having on

(40:55):
our valley floor where we want it intensification development contributions.
We're going to go from eighteen fifty two thousand dollars
a residential unit. Now that made development unfeasible in the
valley floor. Through the submission process, the council has pulled
that back significantly to their credit, but we were looking
at a very real situation of development freezing on the

(41:16):
valley floor for two or three years until market price
is caught up that those development contributions were feasible. So
there's also a.

Speaker 1 (41:23):
Council do that that's sort of antidevelopment.

Speaker 2 (41:26):
Well, I don't think it was viewed as antidevelopment. It
was we need to do X amount of infrastructure upgrade
and we're expecting X number of houses, So what's that
value divided by that number of houses? And that's the
increase we need to do without necessarily any economic analysis
around what does this mean for feasibility of development? And
as I said, to their credit, they've very much gone

(41:46):
around and changed that and made those changes. But you know,
we see that across every council. A lot of councils
are putting their fees up and development contributions up, and
it comes from a very their well view of we
need to pay for infrastructure, we need to pay for upgrades,
and how else are we going to fund it because
no one's got money at the moment. The flip side
is every time you put a you know, if you

(42:07):
put one thousand dollars on a house, you know, in
terms of cost, you're probably heading one thy two hundred
dollars to the sale price because the developer is still
looking for that fifteen to twenty percent return. And then
there's a certain point where the sale price will no
longer be feasible, and that whole conversation around market economics
and what do we do when we increase the price?
Here does to development. There is really really missing from

(42:31):
the missing and I'm finding we're still a very siloed approach,
and that's an area where both developers and local councils
could work better together. If we pull this mechanisms, what
will this do for you? If we change this mechanism,
what will that do for you? And those conversations still
need to be had.

Speaker 1 (42:50):
Because the price of house is really ridiculous, I mean
to me. I mean, you know, nine hundred and eight
hundred is a sort of standard, but you're saying all
of that is under tension because of development fees, which
is providing funding for infrastructure by the local authorities. So
as you're saying it's siloed, is there a kind of
a system in place to look at all these variables

(43:12):
so that ultimately the price of housing doesn't exclude, you know,
a certain percentage of the population. Ever.

Speaker 2 (43:19):
Yeah, I think it's really complex and and I'm a
little bit in aligned with the councils to say we
need to look at a different way we fund our
territorial authorities. It can't just all be through rates and
development contribution in their fees. We need to find a
different way to fund it. But we're only a small
we're only a small country, and there's only so much
central government money as well, So what is the trade

(43:40):
off if we took ten billion dollars out of central government?
What is the trade offs we're willing to accept as
a population to have lower rates and bring down the
cost of housing and maybe removing development contribution fees? You know,
what are we willing to trade off? Because taking ten
million dollars out of the central government system will have
an impact on every day services we get as residents.

(44:02):
So there's constant tensions and trade offs that play here.

Speaker 1 (44:05):
And I wish I had a basic The property owner
is paying for everything, and they're paying for the developer.
They're paying for the rates and the infrastructure, and they're
also paying So really people have to have enough resources
to be able to get a home to meet all
of these economic pressures that are outside of the actual property.

Speaker 2 (44:23):
Yeah, I still think the biggest one to be had
is getting the price of property material building materials down.
I still think that that's in an area where it's
limited controlled by a few companies, and I know there's
moves to open it up, but building materials in New
Zealand as a whole is generally quite expensive. And I
think we've got build rates around four thousand dollars square meter,

(44:44):
maybe higher now four five thousand dollars square meter. You know,
you do one hundred you're building a hundred square meter house.
You know that we are talking four hundred thousand, five
thousand dollars to build a hundred square meter house. Well,
that's the starting before you ad land value, there's're starting
price for a house. Now. I built a one hundred
square meter home seven years ago. Was my daughter eight
years ago, and it was two hundred and thirty eight thousand.

Speaker 1 (45:07):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (45:07):
So you know, we've nearly had a doubling of build
prices in a very very short space of time. And
I think there's a whole question around why has that
happened and what leavers can we do to bring those
material pricing back down.

Speaker 1 (45:20):
Okay, so even regardling all the sort of land values
and land cost infrastructure, they're still the cost of actually
building it.

Speaker 2 (45:26):
Yeah. Yeah, And that's where when you look at a
development profile, you know, we look at a you know
what a development costs, the big chunk is still sitting
in the building material. It's just discouncil fees and all
that on the side, but a big chunk of it
is still the building material cost and that's where the
challenge it. And then inevitably the building material costs actually

(45:47):
influences that urban design outcomes because it's around what we
can afford to build and what little extras can we
do the ex better urban design outcomes. So we end
up into a whole feedback system of what are then
our cities look like because of the build material pricing,
because they influenced that urban design outcomes.

Speaker 1 (46:03):
That was sort of my brain was thinking of that. Yeah,
I mean, I'm interested in urban design, aesthetics and community
and public space, you know, because I can. But you know,
you're giving me this whole sort of economic science breakdown
of how the whole thing actually kind of mediates. And
I'm glad I don't have to think about that because

(46:23):
that would just text me terribly. But that's reality because really,
I mean, to me, boyend economies based is really sort
of the local experience for local people about the experience
of living in their urban space, and we need for
me the future of good economic activity is interesting vital

(46:43):
urban public spaces. That's where I'm coming from and that
people want to go to those places. They want to
activate them, they want to hang around, they want to
do things. They you know, they'll want to rent offices
to operate some sort of business because it's a nice environment.
But then the actual mechanics of all of that and
those people are going to be able to build those
buildings to the developers are subject to all of these pressures, yep.

Speaker 2 (47:05):
And then on top of all that, then it's in
the banks and finance which they want to see a
twenty percent return before they lend to you. So you know, everything,
everything is all tied together. And often and this kind
of brings me to my point I have is often
that RMA is accused of holding up development and it's
a bad piece of legislation and it's out of control
and it needs to be ripped away, and every count

(47:27):
every government at the moment seems to be wanting to
play with it and change it and tweak it and
do whatever they want with that. My fundamental view is
the RMA is not a bad piece of legislation, and
you can have whatever rules and whatever controls and place
you want to do. End of the day, it doesn't
matter because it's the market forces and the banks that
actually drive what gets built.

Speaker 1 (47:44):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (47:45):
And it doesn't actually matter what your rule framework is.
We've enabled six stories through large swaths of our cities.
We are not going to see six stories because it
will never be economical, it won't stack up financially to
build those. We'll see the odd one pop up, probably
like a pimble. But reality is you've got to have
a very large land holding of a substantial financial backing,
and a bank willing to lend to you, and you

(48:06):
can prove you can get a twenty percent return on
apartments in that location. I just don't think we're going
to see a lot of those pop up. Yes, they'll
still happen in our CBDs, like the one Inton CBD
that that's got to proven market, but Upper Heart, you
know other places like that, I'm not sure we're going
to see those.

Speaker 1 (48:22):
Yeah, it was interesting we had it. We had Michael An,
just a mortgage broker, come in and talked last time,
and he was saying he's seeing because he's out there
in the position of providing money. He said, it's all
dropped off because they the developers and here locally, they
can't manage the interest on the money they borrow during
the construction of the process. Before they can actually sell

(48:44):
the property, they've got to hold all this finance which
they're paying interest on to actually get the thing built.
And they interest rates and the cost of borrowing means
that these three story six stories just are not viable.
And some of them got halfway through and it's just
a really big, big strain to be Yeah, so that's yeah.
So this what you're talking about. This national policy developed

(49:06):
national planning pol for the housing. It was a sort
of like a sledgehammer, but actually in reality it was
attractive to developers at the time because you could see
them really getting going. But in reality it's very hard
to serve us during the construction period, it.

Speaker 2 (49:19):
Is, and with cost of development and what are geinion
is now and you know, six seven, eight years ago,
it was quite feasible for mum and dads to sub
divide off their backyard and do a property or two like.
It was a feasible the banks could lend on there.
It wasn't significant costs. As time's gone on and costs
of escalator, we saw that significantly through COVID, it's got

(49:39):
less and less feasible. So actually, our pool of developers,
all the people at the pool of people who can
do development kind of shrinks every year and it's soon
it's you know, it's the big boys are still in play,
and you know a few medium sized operators out there.
But it's getting harder and harder for the mums and dads.
And they always bought on a certain percentage of supply
to any city in any given year as people subdivide

(50:00):
it all made houses for their kids or whatever. But
with the cost of everythings going on, that's actually a
lot harder to do. And I don't know, there's been
a lot of analysis done out there around what happens
when the mums and dads exit the markets? What are
we doing about our housing supply then? Because they always
account while there are only one house at a time
or one section at a time, they counted for a

(50:21):
large chunk over time, and I can see them in
the next five to ten years been unable to develop surpricesing.

Speaker 1 (50:28):
So this what do you call it, the national policy pot.

Speaker 2 (50:31):
National policy stement for urban development.

Speaker 1 (50:33):
So which was all about the medium density rules, et cetera.
Is that just gonna be a redundant piece of policy
because it's in reality on the ground currently post COVID,
it's not viable for the people who actually are providing
those yields.

Speaker 2 (50:47):
I don't think it'll be redundant. It's done what it's
need to do in terms of got the up zonings
that it was seeking and the removal of the parking
spaces and everything like that. That's what that did. What
it's done is has said to the market or the
plan rules are no longer the restriction now for you
to do three or six story buildings. If you want
to do those, You've got opportunity to do those, but
it is now up to you to do it. So

(51:10):
it's taken the excuse away that the planning rules are
the restriction. Now it's left to the market to deliver.
And I still think it's going to be very unfeasible
in a lot of locations for the market to deliver.

Speaker 1 (51:21):
So it's taken what did you say, it's taken the
rules away to prevent that development, which is what that
policy document was. But it's and it's left it to
the market to deliver.

Speaker 2 (51:31):
Yeah, and now the market isn't that what National wants?

Speaker 1 (51:34):
YEP?

Speaker 2 (51:35):
And that's I mean, to a degree, labor wanted that
as well. And the reality is for the market to deliver,
there has to be a market for it, and a
market doesn't exist overnight. And we've got generations at the moment.
We've got, you know, the younger generations who probably will
take more compact living and maybe apartment living. We've got

(51:58):
the likes of myselves in the forties that are probably
still wanting a bit of space around it and don't
want the apartment living so much. And we've got the
older generation, which you're either looking to downsize or still
like their larger properties and the ability to have the
land and you know, do guardian and any and like that.
And so we've also got a melting pot of our
cultural expectations based upon our age and our social expectations.

(52:19):
And not everyone's going to want an apartment. For me,
I can't think of anything worse. I'd hate to be
an apartment I'd go stir crazy. That's not my demographic
to what I would want. Conversely for some people that
it is. But you're never going to solve the world's
housing issues or the country's housing issues providing one supply
of housing you've still got to provide a range of

(52:39):
housing supply to meet to the range of needs and
demands that are out there.

Speaker 1 (52:42):
Because Graham's nodding his head, and I too. He and
I both discussed how exciting it was to downsize. Graham
had a massive house which I think he co owned
with his daughter, and he could not find a small
enough house for what he wanted. It took ages to
find like a small townhouse. Now and me too, I'm
living in the small townhouse and love it because it's
just a certain age thing. I didn't think I would

(53:06):
ever go down that track, but you suddenly find your
sh you're in this world. But it was never an
aspiration prior to that. So things change, and it's different markets.

Speaker 2 (53:15):
Exactly, and that democratic will change over time. Also immigration,
different expectations of different people moving into the country. There's
probably a lot more uptake of apartment dwellers moving into
the country now through immigration because of the countries they're
coming from there, you know, India and China. Philippines are
very used to apartment style living. Yes, that's right, So

(53:36):
there'll be more uptake of apartments in time because of
that cultural shift as well, coming from immigration, but there
will always be a segment of society that wants the
largest space, and so where the MPSUD provides for the
ability to do apartments, we're probably not at that critical
mass yet where that's all that can be a viable
option for a significant portion of a city outside of

(53:58):
the Aucklands Cristes in the Waning and CBDs of the world.

Speaker 1 (54:01):
Because we are such a tiny country. We're not. We
just didn't have the population to require mass housing of
that scale, which means it's why it's so expensive for
us as well, because we've got a smaller population to house,
which all still need housing at a certain market rate.

Speaker 2 (54:16):
So there's always everyone always tends to look at it's
black and white. It's the planning rules not doing whatever.
It is there cost of building, or it's the finance
the reality as it's everything. It's our social cultural expectations.
It's the cost of finance, it's cost the land, it's
you know, the risk that people willing to accept. It's
the finance world, it's the insurance world, and it's everything
like that, and that always got to come together for

(54:37):
the development to be feasible.

Speaker 1 (54:39):
So with all this incredible layers of knowledge and questions
that you're asking and queries that you puppose. How do
you actually do your day to day work and come
up with little solutions to get because you know so much?
How do you actually commit yourself to do? Because I
know that's how your practice operates, making all these decisions
about all these little things when you know all of
the variables always working all around you all the time.

Speaker 2 (54:59):
So our perspectives. We know the planning rules and we
know the planning framework, so that's our starting point to
give our advice. So this is this is the urban
design outcomes you need to hit. These are the planning outcomes.
This is the framework you're in. This is a goal
or no go site, So we can we can give
that very quickly, very easily. You know, even before I
came in here, worked out two emails just outside just

(55:20):
giving a developer of heads up on two sites. That's
very easy to do. We then require the developers to
worry about the finance site. That's for them to know.
That's for them. We don't want to understand their financial positions.
It's not what we need to know. They go away
and have conversation with the bank, they will come back
to us and say, yep, you've told so you can
do five on that site. Yep, we've checked down numbers,
We've got our figures that they often have very sophisticated spreadsheets.

(55:42):
They can just throw figures into five for work, or
they will clear and go. Unless you can get eight
to work on that site, the site's not right for us,
and go. It's not what you're gonna get eight on there,
And so then they would just either move on or
they purchase site and away we go. We're always conservative
in our advice. If someone's buying a property of us
on our vice, will always probably underestimate by a house

(56:02):
or two, because it's better to be. If numbers stack
up for five, then they're going to stack up for seven.
But we don't ever want to say to someone year
you can get seven on it. It come to get
consent and they can only get four, because all their
market numbers will be upside down.

Speaker 1 (56:13):
To your conservative you don't overinflate them up.

Speaker 2 (56:15):
Not at the initiation tempted, not the initial purchase. It
it does no one any good. It does our clients
know God, spending a million dollars on a property that
then can't develop No one's in one out of that.
I would rather not have a job than have a
client in a bad position. It just doesn't work. And
there's many mums and dads who will come to us
with my advice and I want you to go away
and chicken numbers and chicken numbers again, and chicken numbers again,

(56:38):
because I have questions on the viability of this, and
I would rather you say no now, then you sign
our contract and in six months trouble. You find yourself in.

Speaker 1 (56:46):
Trouble because they've got to spend all the money and
the resource consent process before they even get started with
architectural designs and building consent fees and construction.

Speaker 2 (56:53):
Yep. Yeah, and I've seen plenty of I mean, I
think it's in my view about thirty percent of all
application resources them plications do not get built, do.

Speaker 1 (57:02):
Not get built. They go through all that expense, they
go through all that expense, and they never get bal
and they don't get built.

Speaker 2 (57:07):
They don't get built.

Speaker 1 (57:08):
Yeah, that's so, that's that's the joy of resource consent advice. Actually,
you don't want to go you don't want to advise
them if they know that it's just a waste of money.
You should not it's not ethical.

Speaker 2 (57:17):
No, no, And in two in twenty twenty one was
a classical bubble. Everybody was doing development. In twenty twenty one,
many people who should never been doing development was doing
development twenty twenty one and a lot of applications where
people spent twenty thirty thousand dollars per time. They've got
the architectural plans and council fees and surveyors fees and
planners fees, spent that kind of money and they never
build them.

Speaker 1 (57:36):
Like you. I would never put my I would never
want to be in that role. You know. Our advice
is valuable advice, and it's about their lives and about
the capacity to be able to do things. I agree.

Speaker 2 (57:46):
Interesting, yeah, yeah, And it's a complex, complex space out there,
but it's an interesting space and it's a dynamic space, okay.
And I would say to you know what I would
say to probably a vinyon one's listening is if you're
in the resource consent space and you are looking at
doing it development, go talk to your council first, and
go just give a local consultancy call and ask them
for just an initial bit of advice people willingly, willingly

(58:08):
give you five ten minutes of free advice to help
you through a proper project. And it's best for you
to have the knowledge upfront prior to committing to it,
getting into it, and then find you've got yourself a problem.

Speaker 1 (58:18):
I mean, we always always advise them. We do a
pre app application, a pre app appointment, pre application appointment,
and that's when you get all the queries together. It
so before you before I will start doing something that's
not going to work for them. I know what I
was going to say. Even though the RMA you said
is complex and people known about it, you're saying that
it's not restrictive because nineteen ninety percent of applications once

(58:41):
you go through and get and get approved.

Speaker 2 (58:43):
Yeah, as often the challenge is often the challenge a
rise because if the wrong people are doing the application,
or they're trying to do the wrong form of development
on the site and they haven't sought the right advice
at the right time.

Speaker 1 (58:53):
But generally, you know, I think we're were in there,
but generally developers if it's if it's all been approached
the right way, that RAM allows them to get their approval.

Speaker 2 (59:02):
That's correct.

Speaker 1 (59:03):
I think we can squeeze for time. Thanks James, thank
you for having me. This is Rosalindaby here from Local
Architecture Now with James Bebon Planner, the urban designer owned
company Urban Edge Planning Thinking. This program was made with
assistance from New Zealand on the Air for radio broadcast
and through the Excessmedia dot m Z website.

Speaker 2 (59:24):
Thank you New Zealand on the Air.