Stroppy Christchurch hopes to save daylight through recession plane variation

Monday, 26 December 2022

Residents protest against a potential loss of daylight at a meeting on the housing intensification proposals in September.

Mike Yardley is a Christchurch-based writer on current affairs and travel

OPINION: Twelve months on since the Government imposed medium density residential standards (MDRS) on Tier 1 cities, Christchurch could secure a major reprieve from this ill-conceived legislative approach to accelerating housing density.

In a welcome development prior to the Christmas recess, the Christchurch City Council confirmed that it will pursue a fresh proposal in the new year.

The council’s head of planning and consents, John Higgins, tells me “staff are investigating the possibility of applying a qualifying matter that would introduce a stricter recession plane,” than what has been enshrined in the MDRS.

* Housing intensification changes for Christchurch a year away

Efforts to increase housing density in Christchurch are drawing the ire of local residents. (First published February 9, 2021).

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* Hamilton on brink of 'huge changes' as city told to embrace housing intensification

* Plea for leafy suburb to be exempt from new housing density rules

Higgins says the rationale for investigating a stricter recession plane requirement relates to the MDRS recession plane being a nationwide rule whereas Christchurch is situated further south and the sunlight angles differ.

This proposal strikes at the heart of the Government’s cookie-cutter densification drive, while also responding to the central rallying cry of Christchurch’s residents’ associations, who powerfully persuaded city councillors to refuse to notify the plan change, which would have activated the government’s housing density template.

Housing three storeys high would be allowed across most of Christchurch under the new proposals. But a qualifying matter has the potential to significantly reduce the area of Christchurch subject to the regulations, a representative of Christchurch’s Combined Residents’ Associations believes.

That act of defiance prompted the Government to appoint an investigator, John Hardie, to establish why Christchurch refused to enact the new density standards and to determine how the city proposes resolving the standoff. Over the past couple of months, that process appears to have played out in good faith, without any overt pressure on the council to roll over and submit to the Government’s dictate.

Cr Sam MacDonald, a vigorous opponent of Wellington’s heavy hand, confirms: “There have been considerable developments as council planners have worked with John Hardie to understand the problems and find a pragmatic solution.

“Knowing that the end goal is to notify a plan change, the elected council have made it quite clear that changes must be made in order for it to suit the needs of Christchurch.”

Taking aim at recession plane requirements and sunlight provision for residential developments is extremely welcome.

Mike Yardley says “maintaining our current recession planes would keep the faith with our tailor-made post-quake district plan”.

Tony Simons and Geoff Banks, from Christchurch’s Combined Residents’ Associations (CRA) accept that the council must notify a plan change eventually, but are greatly encouraged by the mooted changes.

Simons says that based on the council webinars, the proposals could reduce the overall size of the Christchurch urban area that will be subjected to medium and high-density intensification by about a third.

The proposals would also offer more protections for green space, public land and heritage areas. And they would restrict development along the boundaries of Papanui Rd and Riccarton Rd to allow for future road widening.

As head of the Riccarton Bush-Kilmarnock Residents Association, Simons also believes the proposals would restrict intensification in the entire residential area between Riccarton Bush and Riccarton Rd.

The devil is still in the detail. Just how strict will those recession plane requirements be in the freshly-minted proposals? Geoff Banks tells me the CRA supports fashioning the qualifying matter so recession planes are kept exactly as they are, under current district plan rules.

After all, maintaining our current recession planes would keep the faith with our tailor-made post-quake district plan and that extensive hearings process, while also accepting the reality of our city’s flat topography.

As Simons remarks, “The MDRS overturns all of that, for no good reason.” He also rightly questions why city council staff didn’t assertively protect our operative recession planes as a qualifying matter earlier this year.

Christchurch may well end up with a vastly more palatable version of intensification than Selwyn and Waimakariri, who blithely bowed to Wellington. It would also represent a major triumph for the new mayor, Phil Mauger, whose leadership is being put to the test in heading up the dealings with Hardie. As I wrote a month ago, “the standoff over the Government’s housing density rules is the biggest eel Mauger must effectively wrestle with”.

Alongside being one of New Zealand’s most affordable metropolitan housing markets, Christchurch is unquestionably a star performer on supply. In the year to November, the city consented an overall gain to housing stock by 3943, 75% of which are multi-level units – thanks to our fit-for-purpose district plan.

The full set of proposals is scheduled to go before the elected council in March, with the wider plan change process playing out all through election year.

Neither Labour nor National will be itching to pick a fight with stroppy Christchurch.