It's working! The new District Plan in action.
Plus, your invite to attend a talk by economist Stu Donovan.
It’s been a month since the Minister for Housing approved Wellington’s trailblazing new District Plan. Thanks to four years of campaigning, and your support, this new Plan has raised building height limits across the city, making it easier to build townhouses and apartments in the places we need them most.
It’s early days, but we’re already seeing signs of success. Wellington is finally going to get more homes.
Last month, Brookfields — a Christchurch-based home-building company that specialises in medium density housing — announced their intention to expand their operations into Wellington. This is great news! Beautiful new homes like these will be welcome additions to the character of our city.
And one of our city councillors recently shared this letter from Forma Group — another home-building company — letting councillors know about two exciting new projects made possible by the new District Plan.
“The District Plan changes are enabling more and better housing for Wellingtonians, and we are working to make sure it’s delivered responsibly.”
Upcoming talk on urban economics
We know heaps of you have been working hard to persuade your friends and families to support making it easier to build more homes in Wellington. But sometimes, the economic case can be tricky to explain. Here’s the chance to build up your confidence, and become a YIMBY-pro!
KPMG is hosting Motu Economist, Dr Stu Donovan, for a free talk on urban economics at 17:00 on 2 July — and you’re invited. See here for the details.
Stu has been a great friend to the City for People campaign, and has been extremely generous with his expertise. He is a really good communicator, making the hard stuff easy. We cannot recommend him enough. This talk will be pitched at an accessible level, so you don’t need to have any prior-expertise to find it interesting and informative.
A quick note on judicial review…
You might have seen, LIVE Wellington has announced they intend to pursue a judicial review regarding the council’s decision-making on character areas in the new District Plan. Essentially, this small group of people is upset that the council decided to reduce the size of ‘character’ protections to focus on smaller, high-quality sections of character rather than sweeping protections that cover entire suburbs (a move we supported, because it will make it easier to build more homes close to the inner-city, while still looking after plenty of character homes).
We’re not too worried about this, yet. We think the council had plenty of good evidence to support their decision on character areas, so it’s unlikely LIVE Wellington will manage to get the decision over-turned. But there is a chance that implementation of this part of the District Plan might get paused while the courts investigate. Not great.
We’re keeping an eye on the situation, and are considering what legal action we might be able to take ourselves, to make sure this judicial review doesn’t delay the new homes our city desperately needs. Stay tuned for updates.
That’s all for now. Keep on winning, Wellington!
Ngā mihi,
Eleanor, Marko, and the City for People team.
