The joint appeal in the Environment Court, by Friends of Arrowtown Village, Arrow-town Village Association, Arrow-town Planning Advisory Group, Arrowtown Promotion and Business Association and some individual residents, will be lodged in the coming days.
Friends of Arrowtown Village convener Mark Hosie tells
Mountain Scene the ‘urban intensification’ variation to the district plan, approved by Queenstown’s council last month, came with a ‘‘sting in the tail’’.
Although residents’ concerns it could lead to 12 metre-high housing in the township’s medium-density zone didn’t eventuate, the hearings panel unexpectedly recommended the removal of the Arrowtown design guidelines for the village’s medium-density and suburban residential zones.
Hosie says the guidelines, which remain in place for the historic zone, were the result of two rounds of public consultation over 20 years, and a ‘‘carefully developed framework that gave planners, architects and the community a common language for protecting what makes Arrowtown distinctly Arrowtown’’.
All that’s left in the district plan is a vague reference to the township’s ‘‘existing character’’, which the group fears will be tested by property developers in their consent applications, and lead to a ‘‘hodgepodge’’ of new development.
Because the council had to either approve or decline the variation, without amendments, the group’s hopeful ‘‘sanity will prevail’’ and the appeal will be resolved through court-ordered mediation, he says.
However, it’s confident it has a strong case, and has engaged Queenstown law firm Todd Walker, which represented Friends of Arrowtown Village pro bono during the urban intensification hearings.
The group’s fundraising to cover legal costs, urging residents to ‘‘help us finish what we started’’.
