Panuku Steals Waterfront Park Land

Auckland's public waterfront heritage and legacy is being sliced and diced for development by the very organisations set up to protect it. Councillors appear to have been misled by selective information, and by a sequence of decisions that have hidden the big picture....

Major shifts are proposed and planned by Panuku at Auckland's waterfront to accommodate America's Cup syndicate bases in expensive buildings at a highly prized location as near as possible to downtown Auckland, and as close as possible to Auckland's very fine bars and restaurants. While this might be great for the syndicates it comes at enormous public cost.

Much has already been made public of the loss from the Wynyard Quarter of harbour views and  fishing industry that will result from locating syndicate sheds on extended Halsey and Hobson Wharf structures. But the public is much less aware of the consequences of locating the fishing industry and Great Barrier ferry service to the western side of tankfarm land facing Westhaven Marina.

This image is a representation of a possible outcome for the headland park based on plans prepared prior to the amalgamation of local government in Auckland in 2010. The planning maps currently provide for this outcome once the storage tanks have been removed. The green axis up Daldy Street is clearly visible, leading to the proposed park space, which was intended to be North and West facing, with residential buildings on the eastern side onto Brigham Street.

 

This image provides a comparison. It is an image dated 2010 - before much of the regeneration that was happening then in the Wynyard Quarter part of this waterfront regeneration project.

This image is copied from Teara Encyclopedia where it is captioned: "this is the 2007 plan for the redevelopment of the Tank Farm. It will be linked to the Viaduct Basin and Victoria Park by pedestrian promenades...."

You can see that the artist's image above is based on the allocation of land that is captured in this image which was prepared by Sea + City, set up by Auckland Regional Council to lead the planning and development of the regenerated Western Reclamation. Those plans are all now incorporated into Auckland City's Unitary Plan maps and documents. Until now, no attempt has been made to change the direction or outcomes envisaged in that work to plan this part of Auckland's waterfront.

Winning the America's Cup has changed all that - it appears.

While the reports this year (after winning the America's Cup in June 2017) to Auckland Council are less than clear on Panuku's motivation to suddenly change the plans for Headland Park, their purpose is clearly to provide space to relocate the fishing industry and the ferry - thus making room for America's Cup syndicate bases on Halsey Wharf. (I note here that the Auckland CBD Advisory Group did not support Panuku's proposed changes to Tank farm planning, and asked instead for an explanation of their rationale...).

In September 2017, Auckland Council's planning committee was persuaded to adopt a plan to change Headland Park alignment. The map councillors were shown is this:

Here's how the image is captioned on Council's website: "The Planning Committee voted on 5 September 2017 to progress to the next stage of the development to enhance Auckland’s city centre and waterfront. A package of proposed projects that will also help cater for the increasing number of people arriving into Auckland includes plans for a new ferry terminal and new public space along the water’s edge. The plan builds on several years of successful planning along Auckland’s waterfront and integrates a public transport programme that will accommodate Auckland’s significant growth..."

The critical part of this "refresh" map is what happened to Headland Park. As far as I am aware, reading the documents that accompany the decision, no mention is made in that report of the need to accommodate the fishing fleet and ferry on Headland Park. It talks about the need to align the green space with Daldy Linear Park - even though - as the images above clearly show - the old designs achieve that objective.

This map, though, shows the real purpose. That is the location of the fishing fleet and ferry terminal just south of the headland portion of park, facing west, with new wharf structures...

Maps and diagrams that accompany the Panuku resource consent application for the relocation of the fishing feel and Sealink ferry, contain further detail...

Diagram accompanying Panuku resource consent application. One of the proposed building development sites occupying what is shown as Headland Park Open Space on the planning maps, is proposed instead as fishing and Sealink ferry base. Two wharves are proposed. Dredging is necessary etc etc

Councillors were advised in September, when they voted in support of "Headland Park Re-alignment", (which I don't believe was explained as being needed as part of the big Panuku plan to locate the America's Cup syndicates where the fishing fleet had been...), that a "future plan change would be needed".

You bet your bottom dollar it will be needed. What Panuku is proposing, at a stroke, is to take public land for a fishing and ferry base. What it is proposing is to put the left over, re-aligned public space, into the shade of residential tower blocks.

I don't think so.