Fight for harbour views and open spaces

Wellingtonians forced their council to back down on its development plan. Picture / Mark Mitchell

The Wellington waterfront, one of the city's biggest drawcards, is a virtual apartment-free zone. After 15 years of controversy, it has just 81 apartments in three converted buildings.

By the end of the redevelopment, there will be fewer than 300 apartments - and only 42 will be in new buildings at either end of the 22ha of former port land stretching from the railway station to Oriental Bay.

In Auckland the Viaduct Harbour is ringed by apartment blocks, with not a blade of grass in sight.

Now there are plans to build thousands of apartments on the Tank Farm. Ports of Auckland has plans for 6000 to 10,000 people, and Auckland City Council wants to build 3500 apartments for 4000 to 5000 people.

Wellington's waterfront got off to a horror start in the early 1990s with the dreadful Queens Wharf retail and events centres - the latter coming up for remodelling.

At the height of a debate six years ago to build hundreds of apartments, commercial buildings and even a casino, more than 2000 people crammed into the Wellington Town Hall, highlighting the clash of values.

Should land regarded as public, be up for grabs for full-scale commercial development? Wellingtonians said "no" and their council dumped the plan, known as Variation 17.

The reason Wellington can develop its waterfront without having to build thousands of apartments boils down to ownership and governance. Wellington City Council inherited the land free of cost in the late 1980s from the old Wellington Harbour Board. The development is overseen by a single council-controlled organisation, Wellington Waterfront, with a board of seven directors and 15 staff.

The 35ha Tank Farm is half-owned by Ports of Auckland and half-owned by the private sector. The port company and its owner, the Auckland Regional Council, want the land to be a money-spinner for under-funded regional transport and stormwater projects. The Auckland City Council will cream off at least $10 million a year in rates from the apartments.

There is no plan for a single authority to oversee the largest waterfront development in the city's history.

The former president of Wellington's Waterfront Watch, Lindsay Shelton, said yesterday that Aucklanders had to be prepared to stand up and fight if they valued open space and views to the sea.

"If they don't show that they value these two things, then an inevitable consequence will be large buildings everywhere and the disappearance of the Auckland waterfront having any relationship with the city," he said.

Waterfront Watch continues to oppose aspects of a new framework put in place in 2001 that breaks the capital's waterfront into five precincts with some commercial buildings.

It is fighting plans for a Hilton Hotel on Queens Wharf (Auckland's Hilton Hotel at Princes Wharf has limited public access to the waterfront) and the siting of a wharenui (Maori meeting house) beside an old rowing club at a lagoon near Te Papa.

Wellington waterfront chief executive Ian Pike said the development had a history of controversy but was regarded by most as a huge success. When completed, the 22ha of waterfront land would have 75 per cent open space. Since 2001 Waterfront Wellington had largely funded development through the sale of long-term leases and hardly touched a $15 million fund provided by the council, Mr Pike said.