$150m retirement village for Bell Block
Work on a $150 million retirement village in Taranaki is set to begin in the next two weeks.
Summerset at Pohutukawa Place retirement village, Bell Block, will house 400 residents and employ 50-70 staff.
It will include 220 two-and-three-bedroom villas and independent and serviced apartments, a bowling green, swimming pool, spa, cafe and gym, and a centre for those needing rest home and hospital-level care. There will also be a specialist dementia unit, called a Memory Care Centre.
Work will begin at the end of the month and take five years to fully complete, although it is expected to open to its first residents in late 2020,
Summerset’s general manager of development, Aaron Smail, said.
Yesterday Smail, along with Summerset staff, Ngati Tawhirikura hapu and Puketapu hapu from Te Atiawa iwi held a short Uru Whenua ceremony to bless the land in preparation for earthworks.
‘‘It has been a process of consultation and taking care to make sure we have met anybody’s concerns about cultural sensitivities,’’ Smail said. ‘‘It is amazing; just over the moon to be getting under way.’’
The project has been in the works for more than a year after Smail approached landowners of more than 25 years, Warren and Claire Bolton, who were happy to sell 8.3 hectares of land while still living next door.
Smail said he approached the couple as ‘‘good sites in Taranaki are few and far between’’ and he thought it was the best place for the village, with close proximity to the Coastal Walkway and central New Plymouth.
New Plymouth’s population of over-75s is about 4700 and is expected to grow by 37 per cent in the next decade.
Building work will be carried out by Taranaki Civil Construction, which built Summerset Mountain View in Vogeltown in 2015.
‘‘It is great to see that such a large, multinational organisation has put faith in a local contractor to make sure the income spent with us stays in the region,’’ director Simon Mulligan said.
Summerset has 28 retirement villages around the country and 10 more planned.