Kelvin Grove marked as one to watch
"It used to be nappy valley, with all the young families living in the cheaper houses. But Palmerston North seems to be moving out, pushing past its old boundaries." Kelvin Grove resident Wendy Gadd
Palmerston North’s Kelvin Grove has been named as one of New Zealand’s fastest-developing suburbs.
An Infometrics report on New Zealand’s development hotspots named the suburb as one of 13 key locations for growth in New Zealand over the next decade.
The suburb’s population is expected to expand 24 per cent, adding 2000 people, by 2023.
Infometrics chief forecaster Gareth Kiernan said they weren’t just looking at run-of-the-mill population growth in the hotspots identified in the report.
‘‘Growth of this magnitude doesn’t just require new houses to be built.
‘‘It also needs to be accompanied by appropriate physical and social infrastructure, the integration of business areas and employment opportunities, and the provision of new retail and service centres within the development.’’
And there was still plenty of space left to grow into, with the Palmerston North City Council targeting growth across Napier Rd in Whakarongo.
Naomi Round has lived on Roberts Line since 1962.
‘‘There was only about five [households] of us on the road then.
‘‘It was all metal roads and Taranaki farm gates,’’ she said.
‘‘I’m probably the only one of them back then who’s still around.’’
Real Estate Institute of New Zealand Manawatu spokesman Andy Stewart couldn’t agree more with Kiernan’s assessment of Kelvin Grove, noting most of the sections in the Whakarongo development were already sold.
Most of the development in Palmerston North, particularly residential development, was focused out that way, he said.
Stewart has been living in one of the newer parts of Kelvin Grove for almost three years.
He would not have considered living there a few years back because it was too disconnected from the rest of Palmerston North
‘‘[Nowadays] you can get into the central city, right down Main St, quicker and easier than I could when I lived in Vogel St.’’
Wendy Gadd and her husband moved to Kelvin Grove more recently than Round.
They downsized from the large two-storey house in Hokowhitu because they were getting older, and didn’t need the space any more, and settled on their current home three years ago.
Gadd said Kelvin Grove was a nice area, and since she’d had to give up driving, it was handy to be so close to the retail centre and the Countdown supermarket.
‘‘It used to be nappy valley, with all the young families living in the cheaper houses.
But Palmerston North seems to be moving out, pushing past its old boundaries.’’
Gadd was not at all surprised Kelvin Grove’s growth was getting some national attention.
She still remembers the suburb as being the outskirts - that it was just outside of the city proper until relatively recently.
Gadd said was not sure if the suburb’s fast pace of development was entirely a good thing.
All the development was pushing up property prices, she said.
As of the 2013 Census, there were 6771 people living in the Kelvin Grove area, which was a 39.8 per cent increase since the 2006 Census.