Invitation-only meetings for Ladies Mile landowners in the past fortnight have sparked concerns Queenstown’s pastoral entranceway could be overrun by development.
The character of the tree-lined highway from Lake Hayes to the Shotover River is already changing as construction ramps up on the $500million Queenstown Country Club retirement complex, on the road’s south side. Keri Lemaire-Sicre, a Ladies Mile landowner for 17 years, told Mountain Scene recently the planned density of buildings in concept plans presented at the first meeting was akin to "another Queenstown".
Ms Lemaire-Sicre, of the Ladies Mile Pet Lodge, said she feared the fast-track special housing area process, which enabled the retirement complex across the road to be built, could be used to force her from her land.
On May 22, council planning managers Tony Avery and Blair Devlin showed landowners drawings of multistoreyed, densely packed buildings on the north side of the road.
Those attending were told not to share the plans, and the council has refused to release them.
Mr Avery confirmed yesterday another meeting was held a week later for "four or five" landowners on the south side of Ladies Mile.
The drawings shown at the meetings were initial concept plans, and landowners needed to be consulted before the public.
The council was "not trying to hide anything", he said.
"It was a broad concept and we did say to the landowners they needed to think about that and we expect to hear from them at some point."
Work on a master plan for Ladies Mile began about a year ago.
Ms Lemaire-Sicre said the process was "housing at any cost", and could make the town an "absolute ramble of homes and infrastructure that doesn’t fit".
"Our council doesn’t have the guts to stand up and say to the Government, listen, we need time to look carefully at where we place this infrastructure, otherwise we’re going to have urban sprawl."
Queenstown Country Lodge manager Fiona Shearer, who also went to the first meeting, said the Ladies Mile was the wrong place for dense development.
"I think it’s just going to make the whole entrance to Queenstown look quite built-up and ugly."
Mr Avery said the council was trying to be "a bit more proactive" about future growth options.
"There will be a full public discussion about it when it’s ready to come back to the council with a report that outlines the issues and the full options."
He could not say when a Ladies Mile report would go before councillors.
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Comments
The Ladies-Mile is an excellent place, in the context of the Wakatipu basin, to develop further and a structure plan from the council will prevent ramshackle development from occurring and lead to a well designed and connected residential community.
The 'pastoral entrance to queenstown' is an historic idea that is well past it's sell by date.
Outsider looking in!!!
To put my 2 cents worth in from an outsiders point of view looking to move our family to Queenstown, myself and my wife both have professional careers and are considering moving our family from Wellington to Queenstown, however the housing affordability is challenging this dream. I think everyone would agree that any market price is driven by supply and demand of which supply is the issue for Queenstown, from our most recent visit we noticed this area is already under development with the retirement village so it seems the horse has already bolted so far as development goes, and for what its worth we did not for one minute think it was detracting from the area, in fact we wondered why the rest of the area was not developed as it seems a logical area, its flat, sunny, closes to amenities, schooling, and is least affected by traffic and has developments all around it with Lake Hays Estate and Shotover Country, we will continue to follow this area with interest.