John MacDonald: Christchurch council's 'intensification in sheep's clothing'

Remember how much we loved the Christchurch City Council flipping the bird at the Government last year over housing intensification? It all started when the Government and the National Party joined forces to try and sort out the housing supply issues and came up with their one-size-fits-all idea of squeezing more people onto every block of land. And so they went to the Christchurch council - and every other council - and said ‘you have to start letting people build three, three-storey properties on one site’. And to its credit, before the local body elections last year, the Christchurch council told the Government and the National Party where to go, and said it wouldn’t be implementing these new housing density rules. So there was a bit of a stand-off - with Wellington telling the council to give the go-ahead for people to build three, three-storey properties on a single section; and Christchurch saying ‘you can forget that idea, because we don’t have the same need for intensification and we need to be treated as a special case because of it’. Of course, the Government didn’t take no for an answer and brought in the “mediator” to work through the issues. That was back in November and you may remember at the time I thought the mediator would be more of an “enforcer”. And the enforcer seems to have lived up to that title because today we’ve got the council crowing about coming up with an alternative plan which councillors will consider and vote on in a few weeks. The guts of the new alternative plan is housing intensification being restricted to the central city, shopping centres and what's being called "walkable distances" from core public transport routes. The council is yet to determine what a walkable distance from core public transport actually is or what it means. But with shopping centres all over the city, is this really a scaling back or is it intensification in sheep's clothing? Because if they’re saying they want to allow intensification to happen in the central city, around shopping malls, and in areas on core public transport routes - then that’s pretty much everywhere, isn’t it? I don’t think there’d be too much noise about the central city - because post-earthquakes, especially, we’ve become accustomed to apartments and the like popping up in the centre of town. But when you consider the shopping mall part of it - this is where this fantastic alternative starts to unravel, as far as I’m concerned. And just tells me that the “enforcer” has got his way and the council is just trying to get itself out of a corner. And as far as shopping malls in Christchurch go, I can think of The Hub Hornby, Riccarton Mall, Bush Inn, The Tannery, Barrington Mall, Tower Junction, Eastgate Mall, Merivale Mall, Northlands Mall, Fendalton Mall, The Palms, Homebase and The Colombo. Under this so-called brilliant alternative plan city council staff have come up with, intensification would get the green light in Hornby, Riccarton, Opawa, Barrington, Linwood, Merivale all the way up to Northlands, Fendalton, Shirley, Sydenham and Beckenham. If you live in those areas, how would you feel about three, three-storey properties on the section next door? You’d be delighted, I’m sure. Intensification would also get the green light in areas within walkable distance of core public transport routes which, just like the shopping malls, are pretty much anywhere and everywhere in Christchurch. Which is why I’m thinking that the Government’s enforcer has got his way, the Christchurch City Council has given up, and has come up with a so-called alternative plan that is nothing short of intensification in sheep’s clothing.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.