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Community and conservation groups are fighting a planned 79-lot subdivision they fear will drastically affect the environment of remote Opito Bay on the Coromandel Peninsula.
But the developers say the subdivision is within the limits of the district plan and efforts will be made to preserve the landscape with extensive planting spreading beyond the bounds of the 9.5ha site.
A resource consent hearing for the subdivision is scheduled to reconvene next month.
The subdivision would cover an area on the edge of sand dunes at Opito Bay, north of Whitianga, and next to breeding grounds of the endangered New Zealand dotterel. The development is opposed by the Department of Conservation.
The landowners, long-time Opito Bay residents Murray and Sue Edens, have applied for resource consent to develop the subdivision and an independent commissioner appointed by the council began hearing their application on Friday.
But the Environmental Defence Society and the Blackjack Protection Society, a group comprising individuals and families also with long ties to the area, said the council had helped the Edens by taking steps to remove a structure plan governing the land.
The structure plan, introduced in 1998, included a proposed recreation area on the site, but the council now believes it was inserted in the district plan in error and wants to remove it.
