Mayor’s column: Housing development rules

Council will tomorrow consider the report of the Independent Hearing Panel on Plan Change 29, the biggest rewrite of our city’s urban planning rules in decades.

The core objective of this Plan Change was to enable more intensive development to address the shortage and high cost of Nelson housing. It also aimed to improve how our city manages natural hazards such as liquefaction, flooding, landslides and seismic movement on faults.

Those intensification proposals were massive, affecting nearly every neighbourhood bar the low-lying areas of Tāhunanui and The Wood. These areas were excluded as they require further work on the risks of sea level rise and climate change before allowing more intensive housing.

The proposals were developed during the term of the previous Council. The key drivers were directives from Government requiring councils to make greater provision for housing, a desire to enable a greater diversity of housing and concern that too much of the region’s highly productive land was going into residential development.

There was strong opposition to these proposed changes when they were notified in August 2023. Many Nelsonians opposed allowing six-storey developments in many suburban areas. About 350 people attended a public meeting at the Trafalgar Centre and Council agreed to extend the time for submissions. More than 800 submissions were received with most strongly opposed.

The panel has recommended that the big changes allowing major intensification of suburbs such as Nelson East, Nelson South, Stoke, Tāhunanui Hills and Atawhai not proceed. They have supported intensification in the central city and the inner-city fringe around St Vincent and Vanguard streets, allowing higher buildings and more diverse developments. They have also refined the natural hazards measures in response to submissions.

Their report highlights inconsistencies between the changes and Nelson’s Regional Policy Statement. This reinforces to me that the RMA is far too complicated. I welcome Government steps to simplify it.

Council will consider the report and notify our decisions. These could then be appealed to the Environment Court. Nelson does need to provide for more choices in housing such as townhouses and apartments and make development easier. But we also need to take our community with us.