Media Release: Waikato District Council, 6 August 2015
Thanks for joining us on the road!
After 18 pit-stops Waikato District Council’s District Plan team is back at homebase in Ngaruawahia and are busy reviewing all the feedback they received on their 6 week ‘On the road in the Waikato’ roadshow.
The team travelled across the district from Tamahere to Raglan then on to Mangatangi to chat with the locals about the way land is used, developed and subdivided in their community.
Vishal Ramduny, Acting General Manager Strategy and Support said nearly 300 people attended drop-in sessions and a big thank-you needed to be extended to them. “The District Plan may not be a particularly interesting topic to everyone. Often we don’t know how it affects us until we subdivide land, renovate or build a home, so it was great to see so many people attend a drop-in session and have a chat with us.”
Mr Ramduny was also very happy with the quality of feedback received. “Having drop-in sessions meant we were able to have informed discussions with locals and explain how the District Plan rules work and why they’re in place. As a result, we received very valuable feedback that will now help to guide the review.”
While feedback is yet to be fully analysed, some common themes have emerged and strong support was shown for a number of issues:
- Rural land-use and subdivision – you told us you want more flexibility to subdivide your rural land and to be more enabling when developing land for rural productive uses.
- Environmental protection – you told us you support and value the identification and protection of natural areas but would like to have incentives when these are on private land.
- Heritage protection – you told us identification of heritage should be done with input from the community and that you want to see more education and advocacy around heritage.
- Iwi – you said you would like to see more provision for development of Maori Freehold and Pa Zoned land.
- Urban development including infrastructure and economic development – you said you would like us to:
- plan to cater for different housing types (including affordable housing) and an aging population
- develop more cycleway and footpath networks
- align development with public transport routes
- encourage more resilient communities (how communities recover from either a natural disaster or a major change that is outside their control)
- include provision for home based businesses
- encourage and provide for tourism.
- Re-zoning – you said you would like us to ensure sufficient land is zoned and available in appropriate locations to cater for future commercial, industrial and residential growth.
From here, the District Plan Review team will start to develop the draft District Plan. They’ll be asking for feedback again in November 2016 when a draft document is presented to the community.