Mayor Hubbard serious on city design

Architect Julie Stout and Mayor Dick Hubbard are serious about how Auckland City should look. Picture / Richard Robinson

An attempt to halt shonky development and bad architecture passing for urban renewal in Auckland City is being launched by Mayor Dick Hubbard with the aid of politicians, planners, developers and architects.

Mr Hubbard, who expressed concern during his election campaign about high-density developments becoming "ghetto areas", yesterday announced a mayoral taskforce to overhaul the city's lax development controls.

"I'm putting the property development business in Auckland on notice that I'm deadly serious about urban design and that in future we will not have low-quality, inappropriately sited developments."

Outside an "apartment of shoeboxes" being built in Nelson St in the central city, Mr Hubbard said he wanted the council to "dictate" what kind of developments were acceptable and vet every new building under strict urban design criteria.

Armed with a landmark High Court decision stating the council could set rules on design, Mr Hubbard said the council would insist on an aesthetically pleasing city environment that people would be proud of.

He said Auckland had some quality top-end development at places such as the Viaduct and Parnell but he wanted to see quality and good urban design at the middle and lower ends of the market.

"We have got buildings in the CBD now that are not totally dissimilar to something you would get out of a British housing estate complete with the problems that go with those estates," said Mr Hubbard.

The taskforce comprises 14 people, including leading architects Gordon Moller and Julie Stout, developers Richard Didsbury and Nigel McKenna, Property Council member Patrick Fontein and landscape expert Rachel de Lambert. It will be chaired by deputy mayor Bruce Hucker.

It will hold the first of six meetings next Tuesday before reporting back to Mr Hubbard with recommendations.

The taskforce is based on Edinburgh's urban design working group, which produced six key proposals, including the appointment of a top architect or designer as honorary urban design patron "to promote and uphold urban design standards ... of the highest standard", an annual dossier of the best new buildings and a "hall of shame".

Edinburgh also set up an "exceptional fast-track" planning approval process.

The Committee for Auckland and the Institute of Architects have been lobbying city politicians to study the Edinburgh model and produce a similar document.

In Sydney, central city buildings are not allowed to be designed by just anybody. Unless a noted architect is doing the design, a design competition must take place.

Julie Stout, a member of the Institute of Architects' urban issues group, was pleased with the priority being given by the new council to improve urban design.

She said the urban issues group wanted to see greater co-operation and co-ordination between the various people involved in forming the city, such as developers, land-owners, the council and residents.

"The city is now too large and too many people are living in it for it not to be viewed as a whole being. Before it has just gone on piecemeal," Julie Stout said.

Mr Fontein, chairman of the Property Council's urban strategy committee, said most property owners were interested in good-quality design as long as it did not penalise them, particularly at the resource consent process.

"If to do good-quality design doesn't slow down your consent process then people will embrace it. If it slows you down the property community will shy away from it."

Mr Fontein said the "uncontrolled" and "unregulated" market of the past decade had led to haphazard development but that had changed in the past couple of years with the formation of a panel by the council to vet major new buildings and the huge movement, worldwide, towards better urban design.

Increasing applications before the panel have led to the appointment of five new members, including heritage architect Jeremy Salmond. The panel offers design advice and suggest improvements. It has no statutory powers and relies on developers' goodwill.