Queenstown Lakes District Council’s (QLDC) Housing and Business Capacity Assessment 2025 has been adopted and the Otago Regional Council (ORC) anticipates presenting the same assessment to its elected members for adoption later this year.
Delivered in partnership with ORC, the assessment analyses the current and projected supply of land for housing and business in the district over the short, medium and long term.
QLDC general manager planning and development Dave Wallace, said the assessment provided a crucial resource for understanding how planning and infrastructure decisions will affect future land availability, ultimately helping guide sustainable growth and development in the district.
"We’re expecting population in the Queenstown Lakes District to grow by 80% and reach 97,500 over the next 30 years, which means more housing is needed, more businesses to support those residents and more infrastructure required to service their needs," Mr Wallace said.
"The [assessment] highlights our current infrastructure constraints and future shortfalls in residential, commercial and industrial land, ultimately guiding proactive planning decisions and identifying what we’ll need more of to continue growing well as a district."
The assessment adopts a high-growth scenario to set housing bottom lines, determining an additional 27,100 new dwellings in the district over the next 30 years were required, with 9,100 by 2033 and a further 18,000 by 2053.
While substantial housing capacity already exists in the district, the assessment identifies infrastructure limitations that resulted in a shortfall of about 1,000 dwellings in the short term, especially in the Whakatipu.
A surplus of dwellings was expected in the medium and long term as investment planned for infrastructure and development opportunities increased.
Land for business was also projected to grow strongly over the next 30 years, but zoning changes and infrastructure constraints showed more capacity was required for retail and commercial operations, most notably 36ha of industrial land in the long term.
With the assessment now adopted, further work would explore funding and financing tools to accelerate infrastructure delivery in priority areas, in addition to developing an updated spatial plan which will help identify the location of additional land to meet demand.
— Allied Media
