Council to consider major decisions on Plan Change 14

Councillors will meet next week to consider a report on about 50 recommendations from the plan change’s Independent Hearings Panel (IHP).  

Those recommendations relate to greater building heights and densities in and around the central city and commercial centres – such as Riccarton, Halswell and the Ilam/Clyde Road shops – totalling almost 40 centres and their surrounds that will see zoning changes in the District Plan. 

The Council will also consider a number of alternative recommendations for referral to the Minister of RMA Reform. If referred, the Minister must then decide whether to accept the Council’s recommendations or the IHP’s. 

The Intensification Streamlined Planning Process, which Plan Change 14 was required to follow, does not allow for people to be heard by the Council on the IHP’s recommendations, or the Council’s decision-making, and does not allow any appeals. 

The Council met in September this year to decide on a limited number of the IHP’s recommendations, including the City Centre Zone, the de-listing of some heritage items, and several qualifying matters, which are constraints on intensification, in the City Centre Zone. 

It is currently only required to make decisions that relate to policies 3 and 4 of the Government’s National Policy Statement on Urban Development (NPS-UD).  

Decisions beyond those two policies do not need to be made until the end of next year, meaning the Council has more time to consider what wider housing intensification will look like for the city under the national Medium-Density Residential Standards (MDRS).  

In practice, it also means that medium-density zoning across the city will not be considered until next year. 

Under MDRS, up to three dwellings of up to three storeys can be developed on a property, without needing to apply for a resource consent, if all other rules have been met. 

The Government has previously signalled it intends to make MDRS optional for councils next year. 

In the meantime, the Council still needs to apply MDRS within the NPS-UD zones – namely within walkable distances of the central city and suburban centres – because of the way MDRS has been used as a baseline in the planning for those zones. 

The public Council meeting to consider Plan Change 14 is scheduled for 9:30am on Monday 2 December and will be live streamed on the Council’s website. 

Read the Council report on Plan Change 14.