New Lynn Brownfield Exemplar

This is an aerial shot of a well known bit of Auckland Brownfield. It was taken maybe six or seven years ago.  You can see a railway line running diagonally across the image....

Here it is, as it was then, punters waiting for their train...

...the track ran across a number of streets, barriers down, traffic held up, generally severing the town. Not that friendly. Not that amenable for development and change...

...the surrounding urban landscape was low rise, predominantly commercial, retail or perhaps light industrial....

This was how Waitakere City Council visualised it being able to change. How the area could be regenerated. There was the option of undergrounding the railway through the town - or at least putting it into a trench - and allowing development to come much closer to the line - and generally producing a much higher quality urban landscape... So what happened...?

The rest of the photos in this posting were taken on Wednesday 29th of May 2013. Here's how the streets in the town centre of New Lynn look today. Wide and generous pavements,  great planting for stormwater, well designed seating in the shade of deciduous trees (good for light in the winter, good for shade in the summer)....

Interesting sculpture and planting....

But it's when you get close to the new station that you really notice what this transformation has achieved - for the area - and for Auckland....

The near building is the Memorial Library.  The building behind - so far - is a mixed use office and retail complex, with activated edges at street level. It also contains some parking - so no cars are parked in the surrounding streets...

Across the square from the library is this Anzac Memorial with fountains, and behind it is LynnMall.

This is the base of the high rise complex shown in that picture above. Just opening now. The shops and retail frontages are just being prepared for lease. At the edge to the left you can see a bus - parked. This is the start of the station...

...and across the road is the main station. Bus interchange. High quality seating and amenity for punters. The best coffee stall in Auckland - I was reliably informed...

...and of course access via escalators to the train platform below...

...very tidy, very clean and it's going to be amazing when those electric cables are connected to a modern electric trains...

But that's not all. Back to the interesting complex we saw before...

This poster informs us that an apartment building is going up above it. Looks like about ten stories of apartments....

...Here's a close up of the poster...

A caravan - which was closed when I was there - held some information about the apartment tower. This chart (which I photographed with my phone - sorry for the quality) lists the apartments that will be included. The leftmost column is for the first apartment floor, and so on. The rightmost column is for the top floor - which had the most expensive apartments selling for around $480,000.  The others ranged in price from about $280,000 to $380,000. The apartments contain 1 or 2 bedrooms. Some of the one bedroom apartments come with a study. Some come with a balcony. The floor area of each apartment ranged from about 54 square metres up to about 74 square metres. The key thing to notice about this table is the fact that about 80% of the apartments have been sold off the plan.

I am advised - by another reliable source - that the Government average "affordable home" - the Government definition - is that the home would have three bedrooms and be for a family. However, the reliable source who is very much in touch with the affordable housing market demographic for Auckland, told me that the biggest demand by far is from single women. Of all ages. That is the biggest market.

This all suggests that policies for affordable housing which assume the main need is to build a detached house for 2 or 3 child families with a garden and a lawn is wrong.

This is a model of the finished building. The pictures on the wall are the expected views from the various levels.

Take a bow Waitakare City Council. Remember the CCO you set up to implement this brownfield development? Remember how long it took to plan and to get land owner and community buy-in? Worth it wasn't it. New Lynn is an exemplar for Auckland. 

Auckland Learns from Perth

I prepared this presentation in 2005 after a study visit to Perth. It was while I was Chair of the Transport Committee at Auckland Regional Council.

The presentation covers the three urban regeneration and brownfield intensification projects I visited. Two of them were based around a railway line and stations very like Auckland's - same gauge - similar rolling stock. They're a bit further ahead than Auckland. Electrified....

Twenty of us went. It was inspired by Waitakere City Council's hopes and vision for the New Lynn town centre. There were attendees there from Auckland City Council too - and ARTA - the precursor to the present Auckland Transport.

The first one we visited was called East Perth. The image in this slide is a still from a video I shot of the sit visit - which I could put up on this blog...  will consider that if anyone is interested...

East Perth was a classic brownfield site. As I recall it had been a gasworks. Coal was brought to the site - it was on the water - but all that building work had been taken down. It was a bit like an empty railway siding by the water. Screaming out for redevelopment. But not a lot of existing urban fabric. The crucial bullet point here is the establishment of of Redevelopment Board for the project.

The next three photos are taken from the redevelopment - which was a public private partnership. You can see in this one the attention given to streetscapes and public art. The idea was that what was taken away in terms of backyards and front gardens - giving density - would be compensated by the quality and amenity of the public domain.

A mix of housing types were provided for. This is a five storey terrace.

The architecture was varied in some parts of the redevelopment. One of the learnings was that these homes rapidly became unaffordable - the demand was so high - and the supply of this sort of housing was so short... but it was a very attractive exemplar... others wanted it...

Subiaco was the real destination for Waitakere City Council representatives. They could see the potential for New Lynn. Subiaco was different in scale to New Lynn, but it shared many characteristics - there was a town centre there already - there were houses - but it was run down - ready for redevelopment. The rail line opportunity was there...

By the way - S.R.A. stands for Subiaco Redevelopment Agency. Again - a specific agency established to manage the planning, community buy-in, and to give effect to government requirements for affordable housing. 

This is a streetscape from Subiaco now. Mixed heights, mixed uses, retail... I haven't shown any pictures of the railway station here... though I;ve got stacks of them... just wanted to give an idea of the urban landscape that emerged from the plans. 

Again, a mixture of medium  density housing. Rigorous attention to design and meeting objectives for streetscape appearance.

This is one picture that's part of the station infrastructure. It's the bus rail interchange. Very successful...

Then we went to the Midland development project. It was about 3/4 through the planning. I ask you to look closely at this slide to get an idea of the timescales involved to get the planning right for this community. Again - a tailor made redevelopment agency established. 

This was a special trip. We received presentations from the urban planners, transport planners, project managers, chief executives of the redevelopment agencies. Perth's processes were exemplary - in my experience - and very different from the ad hoc processes considered appropriate in Auckland.

But Waitakere City Council learned from them, and came back to Auckland and used a special Council Controlled Organisation to oversea and manage the planning and implementation of the New Lynn regeneration project.Mayor Bob Harvey is at the head of the table...

Penny Hulse was there too...

This slide summarises what Perth learned from this sequence of three brownfield regeneration projects. None of these projects are the same of course, but the things they had in common were these: public money kick-start; tailor made regeneration agency for each community/project; 3-5 year master planning timeframe (remember - much of this is time invested in getting community buy-in and amalgamating land where needed - let alone getting infrastructure plans in place and funded); strict requirements around the provision of affordable housing (which is quite distinct from social housing).

Auckland Can Learn from New Lynn

Where to target brownfield redevelopment of Auckland? Existing town centres like Milford? (the image here is from the website described the proposed redevelopment of the Milford Centre is owned by Milford Centre Limited, a subsidiary company of the New Zealand Retail Property Group Ltd.) Or Belmont?

The public debate is robust. Communities across Auckland are  becoming highly engaged. terms like intensification, densification, high-rise, apartments, medium density, affordable housing, social housing - are being bandied about - sometimes interchangeably.

The Auckland Plan (which ie essentially the 1998 Auckland Growth Strategy) continues to advocate for town centre based development and corridor development. New Lynn was the first of these in Auckland. It combines elements of both strategies - because the town centre of New Lynn is on a railway line.

As you can see in the posting above, in terms of housing, the New Lynn town centre high rise apartment project provides affordable housing. One and two bedroom units. The majority sold off plan. The main demographic is apparently single women - of all ages.

The Milford town centre proposal visualised above has drawn strong criticism from surrounding home owners and Milford Village users. For all sorts of reasons. One fundamental reason for the concern is that Milford is not a "brownfield" in the usual definition. It is not run down neighbourhood. In fact it's the opposite. It's a strong coastal community. A mixed use area with employment, retail, cafes. All sorts of amenity that the existing community appreciates and enjoys.

It does present a development opportunity. But that doesn't mean it is ripe for for intensification in the same way New Lynn was - for example.

This aerial is of the Smales Farm commercial development on the North Shore. It is virtually on top of a Busway Station. And within a few hundred metres are schools, shops and cafes. But almost no accommodation - apart from a retirement village. 

There is a lot of undeveloped land here. Zoned commercial. Not that fantastic for single lot residential development, but full of amenity, jobs, and infrastructure...

This is the perfect site for a few high rise apartment buildings like the one to be built at New Lynn. Ensure there is green space, look at the amenity and public transport and access to schools. They'd sell off the plans just like they have at New Lynn. And they don;t need to be big. think of the views they would have...

This is corridor based development. Alongside a state highway (negative), but with all sorts of other amenity (positive).

Along the Wairau Road a bit from Smales Farm is Wairau valley Industrial Area. More like New Lynn was ion terms of being run down, low rise, ripe for attention - and very few people living there - committed to their leafy quality environment.

These relatively mean streets do provide a lot of employment. But it's a single use zone. There are some retail and cafe opportunities. But this brownfield site lends itself to consideration for medium density, plus some high rise, mixed use development.

There is not the same high quality public transport close by as there is at Smales Farm. But Wairau Road contains good feeder services to the Busway Stations - and these can be improved.

These are the types of land uses that present opportunity for developing something exemplary. Learning from Perth.Adding to a community, rather than taking away...

There's even a Pak,Save. Plenty of good infrastructure...

Auckland council needs a strategy for staging and targeting brownfield redevelopment. It needs to recognise this cannot be left to the market. Intervention will be needed. Public gain will need to be demonstrated - which can be rfecouped just as it was in Perth, and just as it is now - for example - at Hobsonville.

Otherwise it's just going to be more wasteful and expensive rural sprawl.

Auckland 2040 Unitary Plan Meeting at Takapuna

A very social occasion. Around 400 turned up on Sunday afternoon to a well-publicised public meeting in the hall at Takapuna Grammar School. They had feedback forms on their chairs.

Interestingly, as I came in outside the school building I was approached by a young guy and handed Auckland Council's "Unitary Plan: myths busted"  pamphlet. So. you could say Auckland Council was represented at the meeting. But no speaking rights...

There was a lot of chat as people read their handouts. 400 is a goodly number. Apparently Auckland 2040 has been organised for less than 2 weeks. Its objective is to get 50,000 submissions into Council by May 31st.

The power point projector was fired up. Petitions being signed. Interested people being signed up. All go....

The main presentation was by Richard Burton, a retired Town Planner with 30 years experience working for developers mainly. He went through the implications of the Mixed Use zone (affecting almost 50% of urban Auckland), and put up images that he'd obtained he said from Auckland Council to illustrate the development potential of the Unitary Plan zone for mixed use housing areas. He explained how height controls and height to boundary rules would be changed...

The  he went on to describe the Terrace Housing and Apartments zone, and the possible developments that would be permitted.

The audience was very attentive. His presentation was a careful Town Planner presentation and all the more credible because of that. TVNZ and TV3 were there, so was NZ Herald.

Here the cameras catch a picture of the zone map which residents were referred to, to check what zone their property was under.

The politicians had front row seats. From right to left here we have Cameron Brewer, Dick Quax and George Wood - cllrs from Auckland Council. Cllr Ann Hartley was also present - but she was too far to the right for me to get a good picture....

Here is Grant Gillon and his son who is also a Local Board member, and further along the row is Takapuna/Devonport Local Board members Jan O'Connor and Dianne Hale. Mike Cohen was also present somewhere....

There was quite a lot of content to the presentation, then the MC of the meeting, a Takapuna local, Mr Haddleton (in the blue shirt), ran a Q and A session which worked very well I thought. He came up with all the questions that people might want to ask, and got Mr Burton to answer them. Very informative...

People took notes and referred to their handouts, some preparing their submissions.

It was a terribly well behaved meeting. Very North Shore. I saw veteran protestor Penny Bright there. Not sure there was much fertile ground among the audience for her revolutionary approach. Though when I left, I found myself walking with a sprightly blue-rince woman. I asked her what she thought of the meeting. "We need a hikoi", she said. "All these resolutions are so tame". I was surprised. "We need to march on Council. All of us. That's the only way to make them listen..." And she strode into the sunset.... 

Meanwhile, back in the meeting there were questions from the floor. One bloke asked about the Auckland Housing Accord. I was a bit taken aback by Richard Burton's response. "The Special Housing Areas in greenfield and brownfield. I think that's a good idea. Completely separate from the unitary plan process..."  He failed to mention that it is Central Government and Auckland Council doing the selection of these areas. Seemed unconcerned by the fact that Central Government was about to step into Auckland Town Planning.  

After the questions, slides were put up listing what Auckland 2040 stands for:  "focusing intensification into localities well served by roading, infraastructure and public transport; undertaking centre-based studies to determine the appropriate level of intensification for each centre; protection of character of residential neighbourhoods; meaningful community involvement in areas of planned intensification..."

This slide lists a number of resolutions that were put to the meeting pretty much without dissent.

One "rethink the plan" point listed in the feedback form was of concern to me. It was the last one. It asks Council to re-evaluate the greenfields versus intensification balance in the plan. I would strongly oppose that submission - having sat for years trying to slow sprawl into Auckland greenfield land. The emphasis for compact city planning needs to be on mechanisms to achieve change - rather than blanket zoning controls that permit an unregulated free markets approach. The meeting heard from one resident who insisted that the city was growing and that it needed to change in some way to accommodate that need. I felt the meeting was short-changed a little on planning information about housing diversity, and about the housing needs of the broad demographic - including active retired people (who don't want a big house and garden), and young people who would like to start with an apartment not too far from where they grew up.

Toward the end the meeting heard from Sally Hughes of the Character Coalition. She explained this had started with concern over the risk of loss of heritage and character buildings and landscapes if the unitary plan went ahead as drafted. And that the had recognised that concerns over urban character extended into many Auckland urban landscapes. She suggested there was as many as 100 different groups, each with upwards of 100 members or supporters.

I think we are seeing a little more of the iceberg of residential dissent here in Takapuna. Auckland Council needs to respond to the fact that it has not handled the unitary plan well - when it comes to compact city form. The unitary plan is claimed to be the "implementation tool" for the Auckland Plan. Unfortunately it is not, or if it is, it is woefully inadequate.

Changing a city's urban form, from the vernacular of low density sprawl - some leafy and high quality, is something that can only happen neighbourhood by neighbourhood. It has to be staged. Plan changes need to follow community consultation, actual urban planning (not planning that is only concerned with zone changes), and community buy-in.