What not to do in Silverdale
It is important to get something done right – usually the first time. The Unitary Plan would be such a case to have it done right – the first time. However, from time to time things go awry and everything that could possibly go wrong does go wrong. Cue Silverdale right now and its haphazard urban development that is occurring.
From Bob Dey’s Property Report:
Unco-ordinated expansion thrives – take Silverdale for example
Monday 17 March 2014
The Hibiscus Coast has to have the most unco-ordinated expansion ever devised.
Between Orewa and the Silverdale motorway ramps, over the last 5 years retail developments have popped up along the western side of the old Hibiscus Coast Highway, another on the eastern side. Yet another retail/trade supply development (PlaceMakers) is about to open just off the highway, at one of the 2 entrances to the Silverdale industrial area.
And in the middle of all this growth, business owners in the industrial area called again last week to get their own set of traffic lights.
Everybody else has them – they seem easy to approve & erect for new retail developments, and the new park & ride just off the motorway ramps has a set.
Silverdale was split in half in the 1950s when a straight road was constructed up the hill to Orewa. The old winding road through the village remains, but exiting to travel south now requires a circuitous journey past all the newer retail precincts at the top of the hill.
Entering the industrial area from the south requires a turn across 2 lanes of traffic coming down the hill, speed limit 80km/h, or a turn on to the start of East Coast Rd followed by another turn 100m up that slope.
The Rodney District Council, which ceased to exist in 2010, approved $1.2 million of funding for the traffic lights to the industrial area through Tavern Rd, but Auckland Transport is concerned at the danger of lights at the foot of a steep hill. The NZ Transport Agency handed possession of the old highway to the Auckland Council-controlled Auckland Transport 18 months ago.
At the council’s infrastructure committee meeting last week, Hibiscus & Bays Local Board chairwoman Julia Parfitt supported Silverdale Business Association president Lorraine Sampson in her quest for traffic lights.
Ward councillor Wayne Walker, however, argued against a set of lights for the industrial area: “I understand there’s an issue, but there are tens of thousands of people on the Whangaparaoa Peninsula who would be inconvenienced by another set of lights.
……
So some context to the Silverdale situation since State Highway One (although that now has moved to the Northern Motorway that ends near Orewa further north) cut it in half back in the 1950’s (like the Southern Motorway did out south back then too).
Anyone that either travels through Silverdale or lives near by will know what Bob is referring to with the haphazardness of Silverdale. I was up passing through the area recently for the annual camp at Shakespear Bay and it struck me the fragmentation made worse by a highway and sea of cars.
Bob deliver’s a critique to the planning and centralised system that has had it part in messing up Silverdale:
Silverdale is a part of rural Auckland that’s been swamped by residential growth on the Whangaparaoa Peninsula and more recently at Orewa & Millwater. The Rodney council worked on plans to encourage jobs in the area, creating the knowledge economy zone for that purpose. However, decentralisation of business ceased to be a priority when the super-city was created in 2010, and Mrs Parfitt told the council committee last week 2 of the developers in the knowledge economy zone now want to build houses.
The area has become urban, but with haphazard access. In the wave of enthusiasm for building houses, made easier by central government pressure, short-term construction jobs will be created but long-term business development will suffer.
The old Rodney council developed plans for segments of the Hibiscus Coast which have been overtaken by the competition between retail giants, making a mockery of evolutionary planning. Meanwhile, the decades-long argument over one set of traffic lights – when others are installed almost on a whim – shows it’s not easy for sense to prevail.
The Hibiscus Coast – and probably other peripheral areas – will require a complete new examination to enable better access, more local jobs, sensible community development. But the rules of combat don’t favour that while change is led by individual planning applications and the role of local boards in the political structure remains uncertain, weak & dictated by a centralist council.
—ends—-
The bold red shows what happens when our planning goes horribly wrong and can throw the grander scheme of things out. For both things it will make the Unitary Plan and any Area Plans up in the Silverdale area hard to write and execute with that level of fragmentation up there.
The dark blue serves as warning (and a stark warning at that) towards of our planning and governance regime which I would agree with Bob is highly centralised at the moment.
Ironically what Bob critiques what I pointed back out in my submission to the Auckland Plan back in 2011:
In that submission and as I have advocated before our planning should be sent down to the Local Boards for most things. For more read the submission around Centralised Master Community Plans, and Semi Liberal Planned Districts. Still relevant today if we want to avoid another Silverdale.
Talking Southern Auckland 