The owners of parcels of land with the collective potential for 300 lots are appealing a decision to exclude their property from a residential rezoning scheme.
Land in Abbotsford, Broad Bay, Concord, East Taieri, Mosgiel and Outram was part of the appeal, with each potential development supporting about 50 houses.
One of the arguments being put forward in their submission revolves around how the Dunedin City Council applied a deadline to a request for rezoning suggestions.
Counsel for the submitters Derek McLachlan has submitted an objection notice which outlines their legal objections to being ruled out of scope of zoning changes.
Among these objections, the notice says the process for assessing whether sites were in scope was inconsistent, particularly concerning how developers were informed about submission deadlines.
Crucially, this email did not include any deadline for these suggestions.
Suggestions continued to be accepted up until the council internally determined that Three Waters infrastructure work had progressed too far to include further submissions.
From about June last year onwards developers were informed that further submissions were too late for variation 2.
The objection notice said it was difficult to see how parties could be expected to understand that the process was concluding.
‘‘Counsel submits that the panel erred in putting little weight on the council’s failure to provide a deadline, the arbitrary nature of the one the council did apply, and the procedural unfairness of implementing a deadline without notice.’’
The council started work in February 2019 to encourage the building of new houses under its second-generation district plan, with the variation 2 changes proposing to rezone areas of the city for new or more intensive development.
A meeting of the council’s hearings committee to consider appeals was scheduled for August 18 and 19, but was postponed due to Alert Level 4.
The agenda for the meeting has revealed details of the appellants’ objections.
The hearing, when it is rescheduled, will hear submissions from representatives of 18 landowners. These will also include smaller parcels of land in Mosgiel, Tomahawk, Ocean View, Opoho and Purakaunui.
The council is required to ensure there is an adequate supply of housing in Dunedin in the medium term.
Variation 2 is projected to turn a shortfall of 2160 houses by 2030 into a surplus of 460 houses.
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Comments
These landowners (and their paid lobbyists) say they're unfairly left out. What they mean is they want to make personal profit by subdividing what is precious horticultural land that should be protected for: food security; pockets of nature in our city; biodiversity corridors; to maintain the personality & identity of existing neighbourhoods. These potential developers are only concerned about their own wealth.
We need to protect the qualities of Dunedin lifestyle -- the forefront of which is having nature near us in most outer neighbourhoods so that citizens can view it, feel it, or visit it. Having nature in our lives is vital. It is important for mental and physical health. Not all of us have funds to visit national parks and Queenstown. However, we want to brush with and live with nature.
Agricultural and horticultural land needs protecting.
This is the century of pandemics: Local food security will soon be vital.
Focus on URBAN intensification. Other switched-on cities around the world do. All of this creep out to smother semi-rural land is wrong - very outdated.
Finally, is Dunedin going to grow? Population statisticians say population will start to DECLINE.