Auckland mayor to Chris Bishop: Don’t tell us what to do

Thursday, 4 July 2024

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“Where’s the money?” That’s Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown’s response to an announcement from the Government that it will open up the city’s zoning and “flood the market” with housing.

Housing Minister Chris Bishop said on Thursday that larger councils would need to immediately zone for 30 years’ worth of expected population growth.

That means opening up more land at the fringes, something Brown has been opposed to because of the cost of infrastructure borne by councils.

“There’s no sign of any money, just a whole lot of instructions,” he said of Bishop’s announcement.

“[And] Aucklanders don’t appreciate a dump like Wellington telling us how to live. As a city, we don’t like to be told what to do.”

Brown said Auckland had a third of the voting population and suggested the announcement would earn National “a single term government”.

“Today I spoke to the Labour Party about why they lost the election. It’s because they were trying to push the Wellington way on Auckland and it looks National is going the same way.”

Bishop has argued that zoning changes are needed in order to encourage building and increase housing supply. He said this would improve affordability.

However, Brown doesn’t believe demand for development at the rural fringes backs up at that economic argument.

“I’ve built subdivisions with 100 sections and you have to be careful. It’s a great theory, but there’s a shit load of developers out there going broke,” he said.

“Can you imagine 20 apartments out in a paddock, what life would the residents have?”

He said Auckland already had 30 years of growth zoned within its Unitary Plan, even if the zoning wasn’t immediately live.

“In Auckland we are building houses at twice the rate as the rest of New Zealand.

“The big risk about this is we’ll get a whole lot of micro subdivisions in the bush that aren’t connected.”

Brown has been trying to get a “city deal”, a concept borrowed from the UK where governments allow major cities more say in their own governance.

“[But] this doesn’t resemble a city deal, it’s a way to get a single term government.”

Brown said he was wary of sprawl and supported inner city development where there was already infrastructure.

“If you want to do something useful, convert offices to apartments. You could get another 100,000 people in the city just by converting empty offices.”

However, Brown also said there were elements to Bishop’s announcement that he liked. He welcomed the opportunity for Auckland to get out of medium density standards that would have proliferated townhouses in the central suburbs.

“This is a democracy, and these people don’t want that, and they won’t vote for it. Do you really want to wreck Herne Bay? Devonport?”

Brown also supported the Government’s emphasis on mixed use zoning, having businesses interspersed with houses.

“Howick has houses with no shops and it’s dreadful. Ponsonby has apartments with cafés and I like that.”

Bishop also said the Government will dispense with minimum size requirements for apartments, enabling “shoebox” style dwellings.

“Do you know what is smaller than a shoebox apartment? A car or an emergency housing motel room,” he said in a speech.

Auckland economist Ed McKnight of Opes Partners said smaller, more affordable apartments would prick up the ears of investors.

“It tends to be that the smaller the apartment, the higher the yield, because you can still get decent rent … Some investors already buy hotel rooms and rent them back to hotels.”

McKnight said developers would also be watching these changes very closely.

“A lot of developers stay away from apartments because they take longer — years and years, versus 18 months for townhouses.

“[But now] developers will be asking themselves how many more apartments they can build on their land [than townhouses], and can they then sell them.”

While some might view so-called “shoeboxes” as riskier builds, making housing affordable wasn’t just about building more, it was about building cheaper, he said.

“We can’t be judgemental about how people want to live. For those people on lower incomes, it's about what they can afford.

“Thirty per cent of renters live by themselves. For single people it could be a good thing if they want to rent more affordably.”

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Planner Burnette O’Connor of the Planning Collective said a 30-year supply with a 50-year growth horizon was an opportunity for councils to knuckle down and properly plan for the future at its fringes.

Currently councils only “live zone” for three years.“

“Instead of trying to dial back everything all the time, pretending it’s not going to happen, change the mantra and let’s do some planning.”

O’Connor pointed to Auckland’s deep south and east as examples of where the council was reactively dealing with plan change applications to bring online land zoned for future growth.

This resulted in a patchwork of zoning without a co-ordinated plan for parks, schools, hospitals and other civic amenities, she said.

“You keep getting plan changes because there is demand, but there’s no co-ordinated plan. Look at Beachlands … with that ad hoc approach, how do you plan?”

“The current three-year frame is too short when you consider the time it takes to prepare, lodge and process a plan change.”

ACT leader David Seymour has been quick to declare the death of plans by previous governments he said might have resulted in townhouses on every section.

“This will be a huge relief to many,” he said.

“It gives councils flexibility to deliver more homes while respecting existing residents who may not want a three-storey building a metre from their boundary.

“Instead of pushing rules on councils that favour triple blocks of three-storey townhouses, the plan now frees up undeveloped land and sets targets for councils to zone for more housing.”

Green Party urban development spokesperson Julie Anne Genter felt differently. She said enabling more development around transport wouldn’t be enough to stop development from pushing out city limits.

“Today’s changes to support density are a good start but effectively amount to a drop in the ocean compared to the waves of urban sprawl the Government will unlock with its broader policies.

“We literally can’t afford more car-dependent sprawl — especially with the urgent need to reduce emissions. Sprawling suburbs will see the efficiency of our cities decline and their pollution rise.”

Labour housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty accused the Government of creating “a shambles”.

That’s because the question of who pays for new infrastructure like pipes and roads to service new subdivisions appears to be unanswered.

“This shouldn’t be used as a way for the Government to avoid difficult discussions about density or fronting up with funding,” McAnulty said.

“It’s all well and good to want to ensure development opportunities, but unless the Government fronts with infrastructure money, councils are limited in what they can offer by ways of expansion.”

McAnulty said Labour supported more housing but suggested Bishop’s plan would be at the expense of building standards or loss of elite productive soil at the city’s rural edges.

Auckland Council chief economist Gary Blick has previously suggested that more intensification in the central city was needed.

“Auckland has enabled enough capacity to cater for projected housing growth over the next 30 years, however, if the goal is to improve affordability, we need to do more than meet these projections,” he noted in a quarterly economic report.

“While some households want to locate further out, many more choose to live closer to jobs, amenities, and transport options to get around. Those preferences have driven demand for multi-unit housing in accessible urban locations.”

Blick said upzoning already achieved by Auckland’s Unitary Plan had seen an additional 22,000 new homes consented between 2016 and 2021 — a third of the overall dwellings consented.

“Like detectives, economists want more than circumstantial evidence to make their case and, in the case of Auckland, we’re effectively seeing the fingerprints on a smoking gun.

“Allowing for more density reduces development costs because less land is used for each new home and there is increased competition among landowners by bringing more development opportunities into play.”