Six storeys could be soon built near you
It is highly likely the new Government will repeal the Resource Management Act 1991 (RMA) and replace itwith new legislation. One reason for that change is to have fewer restrictions on development in urban areas in order to provide more housing. However, theRMAalready has several tools to help achieve this outcome.
One wide-ranging initiative introduced in mid-2020 was the National Policy Statement on Urban Development 2020 (NPS). This has the potential to provide, and even require, significant ‘‘zoning’’ in our largest cities, with limited ability for local councils and residents to oppose it.
How can one central government policy achieve such an outcome?
TheRMArequires each district and region to prepare planning documents which prescribe the location, scale and density of residential development. But in 2013, the Supreme Court established the primacy of national direction.
This means a government can issue national policy that must be implemented in cities and regions. It is now a very powerful policy-making tool for central government.
The NPS replaces a 2016 versionwhich emphasised the need for councils in high-growth areas to provide more housing, but generally left it up to local councils to decide where that growth was provided.
The new NPS continues the objective of providing more housing but goes further by specifying where intensification should occur.
The NPS now gives clear and specific direction for urban development in Auckland, Hamilton, Tauranga, Wellington and Christchurch. In those cities the local planning documents must enable buildings of at least six storeys within metropolitan and city centres and within awalkable catchment of the edge of those centres and from existing and planned rapid transit stops.
In practice, this means that planning documents must have a set of rules about matters such as building height, density and setbacks from boundaries that make it easy to obtain resource consent for buildings of up to six storeys in those places.
Local councils have the power to create exemptions to this blanket upzoning, but only in specific circumstances.
While increased density in and around centres and public transport routes is awell-established planning principle that has found recent expression in the current Draft Wellington Spatial Plan, the increased building heights and density required by the NPS will potentially result in far greater up-zoning than has occurred before.
It imposes a uniform approach across all five cities and, due to the primacy of national policy, local councils have limited scope to adopt amore bespoke approach.
Two key concepts are likely to influence how much of each city will be subject to these requirements: walkable catchments and rapid transit stops.
Walkable catchments are not defined within the NPS and so the concept seems ripe for contention between experts.
In September, the Ministry for the Environment provided guidance that a walkable catchment could vary from 400m to 800m to over 1km, depending on the city, the type of centre, or the type of rapid transit. The ministry guidance for larger cities is that the catchment should be at least 800m from rapid transit stops.
The NPS includes a definition of a rapid transit service but not specific networks. Ministry guidance has confirmed the heavy rail network in Wellington is a rapid transit service and therefore, six-storey buildings should be enabledwithin 800m of every rail station. Less clear is whether high-frequency bus services will be caught. Former transport minister Phil Twyford has been reported as saying, ‘‘a high frequency bus service on amain arterial fits the definition’’.
If this interpretation is adopted, then a simple painted bus lane on a high frequency bus route, like parts of Adelaide Rd, could trigger the directive requirements of the NPS for higher density housingwithin 400m or even 800m of a humble bus shelter.
The NPS anticipates opposition from established property owners who may look to protect their existing amenity values, views and character. It expressly states that changing amenity values are to be expected and that such changes are not, of themselves, an adverse effect. This has the potential to remove one of the key planning and legal barriers to higherdensity development in suburban areas.
Overall, the NPS creates significant opportunities for increased development within and near major centres and frequent and reliable public transport, but potentially at the cost of the amenity enjoyed by existing property owners.