Julie Chambers: Back to front policy for old buildings

Heritage protection was a major policy platform for the new Auckland City Council. When inner-city neighbourhoods are changing rapidly, preserving heritage buildings has become more important than ever.

Urban intensification and the loss of old, lower-density homes are intentional results of the Auckland Regional Growth Strategy. Faced with inevitable population growth, the strategy partners (including Auckland City) weighed the value of maintaining today's form of city suburbs against the value of rural land on the periphery of Auckland. The preservation of rural land was judged more desirable.

When rapid urban change is inevitable, increasing the budget for heritage protection is a good call. How the Auckland City Council goes about this task is even more important. One method is to identify specific buildings and apply legal constraint to their development or alteration.

Last November Auckland City advertised for the public to submit addresses of properties they thought should be considered for special heritage protection. Anonymity has been provided to those who have submitted addresses.

Auckland City officers plan to give each listed property a "heritage score". Properties that score above a certain number will be subject to a hearing to determine if they warrant mandatory protection. Property-owners will be invited to appear at this hearing to present their interests to the council.

Between 40 and 100 properties could be subjected to this process.

The policy is being promoted as the best way to achieve the protection of individual heritage buildings. But while financially expedient to the council, it loads the cost of heritage protection on to individuals, is open to abuse, fraught with perverse outcomes and subject to unfairness.

Secrecy is necessary because of the substantial implications of a heritage listing. Knowing that a property is on such a list may make a potential buyer wary of purchase, or another keen to buy and proceed rapidly with changes to forestall a heritage listing. Heritage value is subject to arbitrary notions of taste and opinion.

Who carries out this scoring process is crucial. Further, the number of protected properties will be determined by how many plan changes the council can afford to pursue.

What of properties scored just below the plan change threshold or that do not make the list? If this list becomes public, it guarantees their rapid demise, at least in their present form.

This policy also requires individuals to carry the cost of heritage protection. We might all want to keep heritage environments around us, but no one wants constraint placed on their own home or a decrease in value of what might be their life savings. Nor, as heritage protection is a public good, should they have to.

People who live in homes of heritage value have often either lived in them or bought them because they love them. These people, rather than a city bureaucracy, are the best champions for the protection of their property.

It simply needs to be worth it for them to be able to keep their homes and manage them in keeping with the period in which they were built. This may be either financial incentive or in an equivalent value, such as particular consideration of their needs by the city council.

Owners of inner-city heritage homes in Auckland are experiencing huge difficulties defending their access to roadside parking. They are being penalised by bureaucratic rules because their homes were built before car ownership was common. We need to listen and respond to such special difficulties faced by these homeowners.

Modern buildings provide far greater environmental protection, energy efficiency and comfort than those built at the turn, or even in the middle, of the last century.

Home owners living in old houses may love them, but they are often eager to modernise. Mandatory constraints increase building costs and could prevent features being added to make a property more liveable or attractive to potential buyers.

Buildings from our past create an environment of continuity and stability. Many are beautiful, or exceptional in other ways. Such buildings provide the whole community opportunity for reflection, respect and often silent admiration. They enhance our city. Like public works of art, their presence offers benefit for everyone.

Instead of drawing up a secret list of properties to subject to district plan changes, Auckland City could use this increased heritage budget to ask people about the issues they face living in or owning old homes and buildings.

It could respond positively to these issues. It could come up with ways to make the preservation of such properties much more attractive to homeowners and developers alike. That would be a good start.

* Julie Chambers is the planning spokeswoman for the Hobson community board.