Greater Parts of Auckland are now Red Zoned: 18 October 2024

🏘 🏘🏘 Greater parts of Southern Auckland now ‘red zoned’ and cannot be developed.

A few weeks ago someone let me know that developments in areas around Papatoetoe were about to be ‘not supported’ i.e. Watercare would not support the public connections to waste and fresh water.

This did happen, there were quiet comments for the first couple of weeks but this week the noise started as more developers had their consents (EPA) ‘not supported’.

Needless to say, this is devastating for some and came without ANY accessible warning. The affected areas don’t show up in constraints overlay maps and resource consents are still being approved — developers just ‘don’t know’.

This type of issue coming about is obvious looking at the development frenzy in 2021-2022: developments down Kimpton Rd, Tui Rd and into Otara mushroomed. Large sprawling bungalows on Kimpton Rd gave rise to terraced housing one large home of 5 bedrooms gave rise to 8 small homes with a total of 16 – 24 bedrooms. Yep, something surely had to break.

When Auckland opened up its land for in-fill housing, did they plan or expect the infrastructure constraints that were just ahead?

Some found it hard to get EPA consents last year and early this year but now it has just brick walled.

I have been informed that it relates to some pipe that has been over capacity for years and it wasn’t fixed correctly. Someone has suggested that there may have been money put aside for it and it has been recently pulled out. Or is it just a change in the modelling system?

Again, infrastructure is a massive issue, it is really beyond the cost of ‘new builds’, maybe beyond the cost of local councils. Far too much money has likely been wasted in small private hodge-podge local line upgrades paid for by in-fill developers.

Now is the time to help us by providing some guidance. Where are the capacity constraints? Tell developers what areas can’t be intensified.

The map below can not be verified so I have only included one version, our best attempt to estimate what areas are affected… if Watercare won’t inform us, then we will try to work it out with our collective knowledge.