Tag: Unitary authority

Unitary Plan – The Final Countdown

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VOAKL Reporting Live

Morning Auckland and beyond

 

NOTE; The Tracked Changes and Clean Version of the Amended Unitary Plan is over 600MB in size. This makes it hard to upload easily. However, I will have them up and notify you when I do.

-Ben-

 

Today starts the three day super marathon where the Councillors and the Independent Maori Statutory Board begin the final decisions on the Draft Unitary Plan. These decision will solidify the next version of the UP that will go to the Governing Body on September 5. At that September 5 meeting the Council will decide either:

  • A date on formal notification (which at the minimum can be four weeks after the Governing Body meeting itself)
  • Send the Unitary Plan back to the Auckland Plan Committee for further refinement

VOAKL will be reporting Day One live as it happens via both the blog and Facebook/Twitter.

I also have a copy of the 7000 pages of tracked changes that the Committee will be going through over the three days that I will be using to follow this line by line. I will try to get the 7000 pages up later tonight.

Comments and thoughts can be left in the comment box below. I will be moderating if required (so be civil).

 

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Rates, Rates and oh the Rural Urban Boundary

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Otherwise it is all about the rates

 

Do I really want to talk about the issue that has people frothing at the mouth most on a beautiful Sunday morning in Auckland. Yes I do. It is about those things we call Rates – you know, the money from us that funds Council activities.

As the Council year finished on June 30 we have the new cycle under way. This means the next round of rates instalments is on their way to your letterbox (in August). It also means the next round of rates rises or decreases are on their way as we hit the second year of the transition system (which includes the cap of 10% max rise and 5.56% max decrease).

Tomorrow morning there will be a briefing and a Q&A session on the next round of rates instalments. I will endeavour to have the report and commentary up later that night on the latest for the now current Council financial cycle.

Remembering from the 2013/14 Annual Plan discussions that rate rises were averaging 2.9% – below the 4.8% forecast in the 2012-21 Long Term Plan.

 

Rural Urban Boundary

As mentioned earlier in the week on Wednesday the Council and Local Boards will be discussing the Rural Urban Boundary at a Unitary Plan workshop (closed session). While I am not keeping up with state of play for the north and north-west RUB, I am definitely keeping up with state of play for the Southern RUB.

As mentioned in my “Pukekohe Area Plan Maps and Information” reblogged post earlier this week; Franklin Local Board has been working with their community and will be advancing their proposal for the RUB at the Wednesday workshop.

While the green-zone buffer has moved from Paerata to Drury, the “corridor” concept seems to have been stuck to and is what is being advanced. This is similar to what I believe most in Southern Auckland submitted on in general as a RUB option – including myself.

I do really hope as the most practical and “sustainable” of all the Southern RUB options that what FLB have proposed is what will be in the final Unitary Plan when it becomes operative. In saying that I can think of two spanners that can be thrown into the works that would screw the Southern RUB preferred option up:

  1. Dr Nick Smith and his Housing Accord – Special Housing Areas (unless they go inside the RUB preferred option)
  2. Karaka Collective if their option is left out and they decide to challenge it in the Environment Court

 

As the preferred RUB option proposed by FLB and Southern Auckland submitters staves off THAT bridge, there might be some pro-Weymouth/Karaka Bridge supports aggrieved by this situation. This will be a case of watch and see as the Southern RUB preferred option moves through the Unitary Plan processes.

Talking Auckland will be keeping a special eye on the Southern RUB as it does progress through the Unitary Plan.

 

 

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Figures on Auckland Land Use

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What Percentage is Our Land Used For

 

I sent a question to Auckland Council on what proportion of our land was used in what per Unitary Plan definitions. After the council geo-spatial specialists crunched some numbers this is what was sent back to me:

From Shape Auckland (shapeauckland.co.nz)

 

Our Geospatial specialists have looked into this for you. I’ve included the breakdown of all the zones since it makes quite interesting reading.
Unitary Plan Zone (%)

 

  • Single House 2.89
  • Mixed Housing 3.52
  • Terrace Housing and Apartment Building 0.49
  • Large lot 0.77
  • Rural and Coastal Settlement 0.39
  • Neighbourhood Centre 0.03
  • Local Centre 0.04
  • Town Centre 0.09
  • Metropolitan Centre 0.08
  • City Centre 0.11
  • Mixed Use 0.20
  • Business Park 0.02
  • General Business 0.05
  • Light Industry 0.94
  • Heavy Industry 0.37
  • Rural Coastal 16.66
  • Rural Conservation 2.52
  • Rural Production 47.41
  • Mixed Rural 1.79
  • Countryside Living 5.84
  • Marina 0.04
  • Minor Port 0.01
  • Mooring 0.30
  • Public Open Space – Conservation 7.24
  • Public Open Space – Informal Recreation 1.76
  • Public Open Space – Civic & Community 0.02
  • Public Open Space – Sport & Active Recreation 0.64
  • Special Purpose 1.08
  • Future Urban 0.28
  • Strategic Transport Corridor 0.59
  • Road 3.84

 

A thank you and appreciation to Auckland Council and their geo-spatial specialists for compiling that data. And yes it does make for an interesting read, especially when road dwarfs out quite a bit of the individual urban zones.

 

I shall tell a look at these numbers some more and ponder over them but for the most part, well over of 60% of our land is not urbanised.