Red zone priorities: local control, strategic asset, Unesco site?

Thursday, 22 February 2024

Dallington Landing is perhaps the most developed area in the residetial red zone.

ANALYSIS: Christchurch City Council could ask Unesco to grant world heritage status to the residential red zone in the eastern suburbs, a prominent lawyer once suggested.

That designation would “further enhance” the appeal of the red zone and prevent future generations from building on, or redeveloping, the area, wrote lawyer Christopher Finlayson KC in a 2021 letter to then-mayor Lianne Dalziel.

The idea didn’t go far.

Former Christchurch mayor Lianne Dalziel in the Bexley red zone. She co-chairs the committee overseeing the area.

Staff at the Christchurch City Council were focused on “delivery of the regeneration plan and maintenance of the current area”, residential red zone manager Dave Little said. “Council staff have not prioritised exploring this [Unesco] idea at this stage.”

And the notion wasn’t mentioned at a two-hour workshop on the future of the red zone at the council offices last week that was co-chaired by Dalziel and Te Marie Tau of Ngāi Tūāhuriri.

The criteria for selection as a world heritage site includes words such as exceptional, outstanding and superlative, and it’s hard to see those qualities in the red zone at the moment. Maybe in 150 years.

In the workshop, members of the Ōtākaro-Avon River Corridor Co-governance Establishment Committee grappled with ways to protect the red zone from development in perpetuity, and to a lesser extent, co-governance.

Finlayson’s letter was important because he was the National Party minister for Treaty of Waitangi settlements for nine years. He oversaw 59 settlements, the most of any treaty minister. He also co-wrote a 2021 book on treaty settlements. Before entering Parliament, he was a fierce advocate for Ngāi Tahu in treaty settlement negotiations and lawsuits.

Te Maire Tau at Tuahiwi. He co-chairs the red zone committee in a co-governance capacity.

With these credentials, he advised that giving the Ōtākaro-Avon River legal personality - as was done for the Whanangui River and in the Tūhoe settlements - “wouldn’t add anything” to the protection of the red zone or its governance.

It doesn’t help that Land Information NZ - the agency that administers land titles across the country - doesn’t know who owns the river bed. Ownership is “undetermined”, said head of crown property, Sonya Wikitera. (For the record, the water is not owned either, although water quality is regulated by Environment Canterbury.)

Anyway, Finlayson suggested a local act of Parliament was the way forward. Sponsored by a Christchurch MP, it would provide certainty by setting out the powers and functions of the governing body with the authority of Parliament.

Local acts of Parliament are notoriously hard to pass and change, which was a plus and a minus, according to a staff report presented to the workshop.

In the end, staff leaned away from Finlayson’s ideas and heavily towards a sub-committee of council that would eventually be replaced by a trust.

The committee would have almost all of the powers of the council, except the power to sell red zone land or administer RMA functions.

The Christchurch red zone: Not ready for Unesco world heritage status.

But it could approve third party developments in the red zone, as well as leases, licenses and access agreements. The committee already exercises some of these powers.

A trust would take over these functions once the red zone and its infrastructure had matured, staff proposed. The trust idea needed work and another workshop was scheduled.

Meanwhile the council could declare the “green spine“ - the narrow recreation and regeneration zone that’s mostly on both sides of the river - a reserve. This would make it harder to sell by a future council.

The rest of the red zone could be declared a strategic asset of the council. The Town Hall, the art gallery, Hagley Park and the Botanic Gardens and so forth are strategic assets, and nobody seriously suggests selling them.

On the other hand, the trading companies that own Christchurch airport, Lyttelton port, the lines company Orion, and so forth are also strategic assets and their sale is proposed every few years.

Although unsaid, a common theme runs through the staff proposals - local control. Keep control of the red zone in Christchurch and Canterbury and leave Wellington out of it.

Parliament can override the council, of course, but there would probably be a brawl.

As for co-governance, the committee barely uttered a word. The committee is itself co-governance in action, with five members selected by Ngāi Tūāhuriri, five by the council and co-chairs from each side.

Finlayson and staff were content with that status quo.

Whatever the committee decides, the full Christchurch City Council will have to approve the arrangements.

“Everything in the red zone is hard,” Little told the committee.