How the three-block scheme could look once finished. Photo / supplied
Developers of Takapuna’s under-construction Amaia apartments are considering constructing 15 buildings up to 16 levels, with architects comparing the scheme to the profile of a famous French island.
KBS Capital, owned by Brilliant Stone, is developing the ex-church site which straddles a thin strip between the Waitematā and 48 Esmonde Rd which is the main exit and entrance to the Auckland Harbour Bridge.
Master planning for the 15-building scheme are indicative only and the buildings are yet to be designed fully KBS says.
Jasmax likened the higher building form in the centre of 15 new buildings as akin to the much-loved Mont-Saint-Michel in its planned built appearance form.
Two seven-level buildings are in that first $350m 543-unit stage, now under construction. Those were marketed last year, with plans showing a third building.
Now, KBS has moved on to planning the next stage of the 2.1ha ex-Harbourside Church site and it’s a far more intense use of its land than was previously revealed, with documents showing not just three but 15 buildings there.
Amaia is te re Māori for halo or lunar rainbow.
KBS has gone to Auckland Council seeking a plan change to allow it to develop a much more intense urban form via all those buildings.
The council has not yet decided on whether to allow that.
Local resident Jock MacVicar wrote a Herald letter to the editor this month complaining about the expanded scheme which he says is too big. He received a letter notifying him of KDC’s changed plans for the site. He fears the apartment dwellers could park in his street, accessing the site via a proposed but as-yet unbuilt bridge across a bay which separates him from the KDC site.
“The increase in units has not been officially approved. My main objection is the added congestion that a huge complex will bring to an already congested area. My other objection is the lack of parking which as I said will overflow into our side streets. People who can afford these expensive apartments will all have at least one car each. I also think it will be an eyesore on the landscape,” MacVicar complained.
MacVicar has been featured in publicity for being one of the Herald’s most prolific letter writers.
Images from architects Jasmax, prepared for Kingstone Property Group, show 15 buildings of four, five, six, seven, 10 and 16 levels on the KDC site.
“It has been considered that the site is well placed from a strategic urban design/planning perspective to accommodate building forms greater than the 16m expressly allowed by the Auckland Unitary Plan townhouse and apartment zoning,” Jasmax said.
Lengthy discussions with council officers and the Auckland Urban Design Panel had been held.
Esmonde Rd is 25m wide and “good practice urban design would suggest than an equivalent building height on the edge of the road corridor creates a comfortable urban street environment which would equate to 6/7 storeys,” Jasmax said.
The outer edge or perimeter of the site should have the lowest buildings. But taller buildings could be at the centre.
“At the very centre of the site, it is considered that a single taller element could help to reinforce the shape of the land and respond to the natural history of the site that is likely to have contained taller trees away from the coastal edge. In this regard, it is suggested that a single tower element up to 16 storeys could be appropriate, subject to the highest design quality controls and assessment criteria,” the Jasmax document said.
It used an image of Mont-Saint-Michel to show how building height lines look good when they reach an apex at the centre. Jasmax also drew comparisons between the Shore site and the French island.
“The site sits on a promontory surrounded by mangroves, almost island-like. Being conscious of minimising visual impact issues, it was decided to reinforce the island-like form by limiting the height of development around the perimeter and to concentrate the massing in the centre. The precedent used to illustrate this was Le Mont-Saint-Michel, a French stronghold with a 1000+ year built history,” Jasmax said.
Almost an island surrounded on three sides by coastal mangroves, the site is connected to the major land mass of Takapuna only by Esmonde Rd which runs across the northern boundary, the architects said.
The aim of building there was to create a new, highly connected, compact neighbourhood offering a unique urban lifestyle, provide a mixture of uses, predominantly residential, supporting amenities likeshared workspaces, cafe, fitness/wellness facilities and a variety of resident communal spaces.
The site is 5km from the Auckland CBD and just over 800m from Takapuna’s centre.
Philip Moll, a conservationist and photographer, has expressed concern about developments and their effects on the fragile environment where birds live.
“They feed and roost during our summer in estuaries around New Zealand from September to March,” he said, although he stressed they did not nest here.
Moll is was one of a group who campaigned to get signs erected to highlight the precious wetlands of Ngataringa and Shoal Bays where this month godwits were welcomed back.
Vehicles are sometimes driven onto the shell banks, despite attempts to stop them with barriers and warning signs. Dog owners are also advised to keep their pets on the leash in the areas.
The first three buildings granted consent on the site will have 81 carparks. The first buildings will have 37 one-bedroom, 32 two-bedroom, 17 three-bedroom and a 167sq m healthcare facility, 216sq m childcare centre, shop, with and 470sq m for communal and retail areas.
KBS has taken deposits for units of one-bedroom plus a study which were last year being advertised from $789,000, two-bedroom apartments for $989,000 and three bedrooms from $1.75m.
Abu Hoque, planner and urban designer for Amaia, said of the 15-building scheme: “That is the master plan vision for the site that was discussed with Auckland Council and the Urban Design Panel and got support, so the plan change has been lodged.”
Of the first 104 units marketed, initial deposits had been taken on 67 per cent, Hoque said.
An Auckland Council spokesperson said of the 15-building plans up to 16 storeys high: “No resource consents have been lodged as yet for stage three as this is reliant on the plan change decision. Additionally, no consents have been lodged or granted which seek to increase the height or number of units in stages one and two.”
During the course of getting consents for the plan change, “KBS Capital decided to undertake a complete master planning review of the site. This has resulted in the current plan change application and it is intended that the proposed plan change will build on this approved resource consent to enable the completion of stage three of the development in accordance with the masterplan and stages one and two”, the spokesperson said.
“Note they advise in their master plan that building heights for stage three are indicative only because these buildings are yet to be designed fully,” she said.
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