jul 11, 1997 - Waitakere Council trials high density housing
Description:
Waitakere City is testing market demand for higher density, so-called "environmentally sound" suburban living.
The experimental "new urbanist" subdivision in Te Atatu is said to be the first of its kind in New Zealand.
Given one of the reasons people moved to the suburbs was the chance for larger properties and the right to do their own thing on them, Waitakere City's move to encourage more people on to smaller blocks with restrictive building guidelines seems risky.
But so far market demand indicates the risk may pay off.
The council put up a highly desirable block of coastal land on the Te Atatu Peninsula as collateral and, through its local authority trading enterprise, Waitakere Properties, went into a joint venture with Hopper Developments to design, prepare and market Harbour View Estate.
This arrangement allowed the council to introduce design features at odds with the accepted New Zealand approach to suburbanisation.
It also gave Hopper a chance to develop a coastal site it could not have afforded to buy outright.
Waitakere City Council is committed to urban "densification": More people living in smaller areas to minimise environmental impacts.
This "new urbanist" approach emphasises safe neighbourhoods where pedestrians have the upper hand, car use is limited and - in so far as design influences behaviour - children can play in the park watched over by friendly neighbours.
A far larger-than-normal proportion of the subdivision is left in reserve land, or is earmarked as common land, to attract both subdivision residents and the public generally to wander. And the aim is for a variety of housing types on a range of property sizes to satisfy various lifestyles and incomes.
Waitakere Properties development manager Glen Metcalf said only 35 of the 89 first-stage sites were left to sell - other sites would be available at a later date. Sites had realised prices far in excess of the original land valuation.
This has to be offset against the extra costs associated with a new urbanist development, including such things as landscaping.
In addition, it is the higher-value properties that have sold; the level of demand for lower-value land is untested. But Mr Metcalf is confident ratepayers will see a healthy return on the investment.
By coincidence another, more traditional, subdivision is being done just down the road by CDL at Waimanu Bay. Returns on those properties will be a good market comparison.
In the end, what will sell the Harbour View properties could be location, location, location, not its new-urbanist design.
Buyers will be attracted to clear views of the upper Waitemata Harbour and the 15-minute drive to the city.
Source: WAITAKERE'S VILLAGE TRIAL DRAGS U BACK TO NEIGHBOURLY TIMES.
By STEPHEN KNIGHT.
1375 words
11 July 1997
National Business Review
NATBR
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