Council too vague about location of Wellington development, apartment owners win case

Wednesday, 5 July 2023

The public will have another chance to submit on the large commercial development planned for the car park of the Michael Fowler Centre.

The Environment Court decided the Wellington City Council’s public notices, which gave the address “110 Jervois Quay”, inadequately described the location.

The development by Willis Bond, planned for the site occupied by the Royal New Zealand Ballet, was publicly notified because of adverse effects on the environment and surrounding buildings.

The proposed building was previously touted as the “Juilliard of the Pacific” with the first and second floors to be occupied by Victoria University’s School of Music and the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra.

Four residents who live across the street in the Civic Chambers apartments argued the council notice could have misled people about the location of the development.

The decision said the site had previously been described with eight different addresses, on four different streets (Harris St, Victoria St, Jervois Quay and Wakefield St).

In newspaper notices and on the council’s website it was described only with the address the development would be given in future: 110 Jervois Quay.

The council and developer argued that was sufficient, because it was a legitimate street address and people could find further information on the website.

The Court found that choosing just one of the many addresses was “somewhat of a lottery”.

In all documents except the public notices, the street address was “invariably” accompanied by reference to the Michael Fowler Centre car park or the Royal New Zealand Ballet. That additional information was not provided when the council publicly notified the resource consent.

The location of the development was inadequately described and affected people might have missed out on making a submission.

The Court could not grant resource consent because of this mistake.

Willis Bond senior development manager Rosalind Luxford said it was too early to know exactly what impact the decision would have on the timing of the development.

“We are naturally disappointed with this delay but respect the Court’s decision and remain committed to bringing this excellent development to the heart of Wellington,” she said.

Council consenting and compliance manager Mark Pattemore said it was the first time the team had encountered a ruling about the address of a site “but of course we’ll abide by it”.

Pattemore said the decision “means [the council will] have to give this more thought for resource consent public notices, particularly for larger high-profile sites”.

The council was in discussions with the developer, who would make the final decision about whether to re-notify the resource consent.

If it is re-notified, the council will have to collect further submissions before the application goes back to the Court.

In 2021 the council, which owns the site, voted to lease the car park land to Willis Bond for 175 years.

The terms of the lease are not publicly available, but the council planned to use the profit to offset the cost of earthquake strengthening the Town Hall and Te Ngākau Civic Square buildings.