Project to repopulate central Christchurch
Incentives could be part of a new attempt to boost central Christchurch’s population, after a report showed multiple reasons for residents staying away.
Christchurch’s inner-city population of 6000 is a third lower than before the earthquakes, and a New Zealand Property Council report has labelled the authorities’ target of 20,000 residents by 2024 unrealistic.
The report listed high land and building costs, affordability in the suburbs, consent hassles and a lack of apartment culture among the reasons for the lack of population growth.
This week a Christchurch City Council committee will consider a newly announced three-year plan aimed at accelerating the repopulation.
The plan includes exploring development incentives, a new advice service and online database of information for developers and buyers, a plan to maintain amenities and infrastructure, and a marketing campaign. It includes a rescheduled 2028 target for 20,000 residents.
Mayor Lianne Dalziel said the plan included ways to ‘‘kick things into gear’’, including building neighbourhood identity and making highdensity living work.
Christchurch had seen a lot of retail, office and civic development, ‘‘but the missing ingredient is people,’’ she said.
The council also needed to fasttrack development, and had ‘‘some of the tools to do that, and will investigate others’’.
‘‘We would like to reduce the risk and increase the feasibility of development, and offer support to developers
‘‘The missing ingredient is people.’’ Christchurch Mayor Lianne Dalziel
through the entire process.’’
The plan is called Project 8011, after the central city postcode and the estimated number of homes needed for 20,000 people.
Possible development incentives include low-equity loans, rebates on development contributions, and investment from the NZ Super Fund.
Project 8011 would try to boost resident numbers by providing more choice in housing, and by ‘‘encouraging, supporting and accelerating the delivery of the required homes’’, a council statement said.
Property Council South Island president Roger Davidson welcomed the new plan, but said the council would need to work with the property industry to make it a reality.
‘‘A focused approach is necessary to get things moving,’’ he said. ‘‘Our research suggests some key areas need to be addressed before we will see successful residential development in the central city.’’
Several major central Christchurch apartment developments, especially ones with dearer homes, have been cancelled or postponed since the earthquakes.
The property council’s research found that a major barrier to new apartments was the high cost of land and construction. Banks’ tightened lending rules for new developments and a lack of older buildings available for redevelopment were also holding things back, the researchers said.
The city lacked the ‘‘apartment culture’’ of Auckland and Wellington, where high prices for homes in inner suburbs pushed people into apartments, the report said.
A lack of community feeling in the central city was another deterrent, with Christchurch’s ongoing construction and spread-out development having an influence, the report said. METRO SPORTS PAGE 2
Groundworks on the metro sports facility are about to begin as ‘‘high calibre’’ contractors put their hands up to build the longdelayed facility, O¯ ta¯ karo’s new boss says.
The Crown rebuild company is in charge of the $300 million anchor project which was put on hold last November due to a dispute over the design and build contract before going through a Government review resulting in a trimmed-back version of the facility, the design for which is complete. New chief executive John Bridgman, who’s been behind the desk for about two weeks, said there had been ‘‘strong interest’’ in the contract to build the facility.
‘‘The feedback we have from
‘‘The feedback we have from the market is we’ve done a good job.’’
O¯ ta¯ karo CEO John Bridgman
the market is we’ve done a good job with the contract and set the project up for success from that perspective . . . the contractors we’ve got lining up are high calibre organisations.’’
He said Otakaro was now evaluating the expressions of interest. The build-only contract is different from the previous design and build agreement with Leighs Cockram Joint Venture, which Otakaro terminated over the allocation of risk and a $75m budget blowout in November – though Leighs Cockram disputed