Media Release

14 February, 2008

Waitakere City continues to support Hobsonville development

Waitakere City Deputy Mayor Penny Hulse says that the Council is “standing in the market to ensure that Auckland gets both jobs and housing at Hobsonville”.

Hard on the heels of the Government’s announcements about making housing affordable, Waitakere City Council has announced it is going ahead with creating skilled jobs in the same vicinity.

The Council’s property company, Waitakere Properties, has announced that it is seeking development partners for its 16 hectare site at Hobsonville to develop its super-yacht building cluster at Hobsonville.

“This fits closely with the Government’s announcement on housing. The city of the future encourages affordable housing as part of its housing mix and co-locates its housing with local jobs and wealth generation. It builds a whole community on sustainable principles and serves it with excellent public transport,” says Cr Hulse.

“There is clearly a lot of uncertainty about speculative development right now, which is why it takes the stability of local and central government to make affordable housing and local, high-end jobs happen together. Waitakere City and central government working together is showing that we can achieve large-scale urban transformation in Auckland.”

Councillor Hulse noted that the time it has taken to bring this comprehensive development of Hobsonville has had benefits.

“Since New Zealand Defence Forces began to shift off Hobsonville, we have worked to ensure that the jobs that were lost will be replaced. By November this year we will see the start of building on the new state highway 18 across the north-west, plus the housing development, plus Council’s super-yacht cluster. This is a new coordinated plan for the north-west of Auckland. We want a business partner to join with us to make the public and private sector to develop this part of Auckland together.”

Regarding the costs and benefits of what the Council was seeking from Hobsonville, she said: “Council has invested significantly on the land, and we want to see a large superyacht cluster with many hundreds of high-end jobs there as a result.”

Councillor Hulse also linked the development of Hobsonville to the review of Auckland’s governance, now underway, saying “It takes smart, active government of Waitakere’s size and scale to link emerging local opportunities like this with central government policy."

"Together, we are a powerful force for good. It is important that any government use Waitakere and government’s role in Hobsonville as a model on how to transform the productivity and housing affordability of the Auckland region.”

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