Project tipped to slash land values

Property-owners with pylons built near their homes could lose up to a quarter of their property's value, says the Real Estate Institute of New Zealand.

National president Howard Morley says residents along Transpower's proposed 400kV line should seek professional advice.

Lifestyle block owners and those in residential areas will be hardest-hit if the line goes ahead.

"If the line goes directly over a residential property it can take up to 20 to 25 per cent off the value," Mr Morley says.

Those faced with lines running alongside their homes could lose up to 15 per cent.

Property Institute president Chris Seagar says the lines will affect values but how much will depend on where they are placed on a property and the desirability of the location.

"They could destroy a lot of the value of a property if there is a pylon sitting on the property as opposed to lines just running over it."

Mr Seagar says there is a stigma attached to living under pylons and lines, due to debate in recent times about the health effects. "Certainly those people who have had high-tension lines running over their properties [in the past], their values have been affected tangibly."

Putaruru lifestyle block owner Dave Rennie and his wife, Helen, are among hundreds affected by the lines proposal.

An aerial photo of their 1.2ha property, where they have lived for 20 years, arrived in the mail last November. Shaded lines covered the length and breadth of it.

It was Transpower's formal notification that their property lay along a proposed route for the 400kV lines strung on pylons up to 70m high.

"There was no warning - it just turned up in the mail," says Mrs Rennie. "We were gutted, devastated."

Mr Rennie says it is not acceptable for the state "to put a gun to my head and say we intend to destroy your lifestyle".

Mr Morley says it will be the small block owners living on 2-4ha who will face the largest losses.

"If they run right along a road frontage they take away from the road frontage and appeal of the property and you lose more than if it went through back paddocks on a farm."

The same week the Rennies received their picture, hundreds of residents along the two proposed routes from the Whakamaru substation to Otahuhu were all shaking their heads.

Trees and gardens lovingly developed would have to go for the pylons to march across lifestyle properties.

Mr Rennie says Transpower has told them vegetation within 50m of the lines would have to go and any trees within 100m would also have to be cleared.

In the case of small lifestyle block owners like themselves, he says, "we'll be left with a bare section with at least one ugly pylon on it".

Mr Rennie says he and his wife have yet to get in a property valuer to assess the impact on their home's value but he is not optimistic. "Would you want to buy a three-acre lifestyle block with a 70m pylon running through it or over it?"

He says it is unfair for Transpower to expect a small number of people to shoulder its quick fix.

At the other end of the proposed route, Steve Hunt wanders across his 4ha block in the Hunua Valley where he has lived for 14 years.

"Coming out here was a bit of a dream. I lived on a lifestyle block with my grandparents and I think it's an excellent lifestyle."

Mr Hunt says debate over the proposed line has already seen the property market drop off, with real estate agents not visiting the valley as regularly.

Concern about the effect on land values in the area is evident when his next door neighbour ushers the Herald away from taking photos of existing lines running over her property.

The Whakamaru-to-Otahuhu lines built in the 1950s and 60s already run through the valley. The neighbour does not want attention drawn to them now the debate over the new route has hit headlines.

Mr Hunt says the compensation offered is not enough because it covers only land owners who have a pylon on their property, not those who are forced to watch the lines running over their paddocks.

Transpower's project manager for the proposed line, Mike Tucker, says compensation for land owners is an issue which will be discussed when the final route option is decided.

What it's about

The top half of the North Island - especially Auckland - cannot get enough electricity from the rest of the country because transmission lines are outdated.

Transpower, the company that runs the national grid, wants to solve the problem by building a new line of bigger pylons up to 70m high through private land from the south Waikato to South Auckland.

Many land-owners say the pylons will wreck their property values, restrict their ability to use their land and may also damage their health.

This week the Herald examines the argument from both sides. We talk to the planners who say the new line is essential and the protesters vowing to fight it to the bitter end.

The series

Monday: Land-owners vow to fight.

Tuesday: Do we really need it?

Tomorrow: The legal battle.

Friday: Our clean, green image.