David Hay supports Unitary Plan 100%

Mayoral candidate David Hay has pledged his support for the Unitary Plan recommendations, as delivered by the Independent Hearings Panel last week.

"The Independent Hearings Panel has done an excellent job" said Mr Hay. "They have made decisions that needed to be made, which the Auckland Council has had neither the courage nor foresight to make itself."

"This goes back nearly 20 years, to the Auckland Regional Growth Strategy in 1999, when the regional council and seven local authorities agreed to develop Auckland on the basis of a compact, quality, urban form. Over subsequent years, then decades, Auckland City Council resiled from making the zoning changes needed to fulfil that commitment on Auckland's central isthmus - although some intensification did happen on the North Shore, around Albany, and in Manukau City around Flatbush."

"Auckland became stuck. It could not expand significantly beyond the central isthmus, which it never will, until or unless there is an extensive rapid rail network that services the entire region. Governments led by both the National and Labour parties have focused on building motorways instead. Auckland could neither grow upward nor outward, and the extremely high house prices and extraordinary traffic congestion that we now suffer have been the consequences."

"The super city council was created to overcome that deadlock, but it has struggled." said Mr Hay. "While the public transport system is improving, there is still no central government commitment to building the Rapid Transit Network, as set out in the Auckland Plan. And the Unitary Plan, in its earlier versions, did not deliver the necessary levels of intensification."

"The Independent Hearings Panel has now invited the Auckland Council to do the right thing: to free up land for new housing development both on and off the central isthmus. Auckland's councillors now have to step up, show some backbone, and accept the panel's recommendations. If they don't, then Aucklanders should vote them out at the forthcoming elections." said Mr Hay.

"I am one hundred percent behind the recommendations, as the Independent Hearings Panel has presented them. It is essential, at this time, that the council adopts this new plan and moves ahead." said Mr Hay. " If some fine-tuning is required, then that can and should be done by specific district plan changes, under the incoming council."

"Auckland needs to move on to dealing with the next part of the overall problem, which is fixing the transport system. There is still a great deal to be done, if we are going to persuade government to develop a sustainable, efficient and effective rapid rail network for Auckland."

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