Council praised for plan to stretch Tank Farm talks by 2 months

The Auckland City Council is being praised for taking more time to work on the complex planning and governance issues for the largest waterfront development in Auckland's history.

The council is looking to extend the May 31 deadline to notify a plan change for the Tank Farm for up to two months with agreement from the two main landowners, Ports of Auckland and Viaduct Harbour Holdings.

City development general manager John Duthie said it was important "we take great care to get the ground rules right" for the 35ha Tank Farm site.

"We are aiming for the end of May but as all the parties involved have agreed to an extension, this is something we are considering," Mr Duthie said.

Concerns have been raised that the council and others have been rushing to meet the May 31 deadline when work is not due to start until 2009 and is planned to go on until 2025.

This follows a huge public backlash against a council concept plan for thousands of apartments on the headland jutting out in the Waitemata Harbour and fears a makeshift governance structure will scupper the project. The notification of the plan change will be the start of another round of public consultation.

The Committee for Auckland - a non-political charitable trust to promote and develop the region - has welcomed the extension but board member Richard Didsbury questioned if it was long enough.

Mr Didsbury said the council and stakeholders had done a great job planning the development south of Jellicoe St but a lot of work still needed to be done on the headland north of Jellicoe St, where opinion was still divided between private use for apartments and public facilities like parkland and public buildings.

There was no rush to develop the headland, where leases for the bulk liquid industries were not due to expire until 2016-2025, he said.

Heart of the City chief executive Alex Swney said an extension was great news. Two months was exactly right.