Newspaper Article 1994 – Lyndhurst-rezone fight planned

Lyndhurst-rezone fight planned

By Simon Birkbeck
Staff reporter, Hastings

Landowners in the Lyndhurst Rd area of Hastings have formed a group to fight any move to rezone their land.

The group of “concerned citizens” also includes Hawke’s Bay Fruitgrowers Association president David Mardon, MAF policy agent Lou Bird and former city councillor Alan Grant.

The group was formed “in response to a small group of Lyndhurst landowners, developers, and real estate agents who are intent on persuading the council to revisit the issue of zoning for the Lyndhurst block”.

Those people had a vested interest and were out to obtain a rezone for personal profit, the group said.

Farmer Ted Hill, one of the biggest landowners in the area, said not all landowners were in favour of rezoning.

“The Lyndhurst block is seen as the easiest and cheapest option. This might be all right from a short-term point of view, but is it the best for the long-term haul?”

The group accused successive councils of not learning from their mistakes.

Orchardist Peter Beaven said the council had “no continuity of memory”, and the problem of subdivision kept arriving with no solution ever being found.

“In the past 40 years people have watched the town then the city of Hastings nibble away at many of its boundaries. It cannot be in the interests of Hastings to continue to keep doing this,” he said.

Mr Beaven said Flaxmere was the council’s only attempt to stop the loss of land to development, but its growth had been badly managed.

“The fact that Flaxmere was mismanaged does not alter the truth of the underlying logic that future expansion must occur on less productive land slightly further away from the existing boundaries.”

The group said the council had other options.

Graham Hill suggested industrial sites along Omahu Rd be developed, and the resulting vacant industrial land in inner Hastings be set aside for housing.

Alan Grant said the city could expand “vertically”.

He said the council should look at the possibility of introducing multi-storey housing.

“The idea of upward instead of outward has a lot of merit as long as the housing is made desirable.” Mr Beaven said the group intended to put pressure on the council to “defend their earlier decision”.

“At the moment, the group is a loose collection of concerned citizens but we intend to take things further.”

Photo caption – Left to right, Ted Hill, Lois Hill, Graham Hill, Michael Hill, Lynn Hill, David Mardon, Alan Grant, Jean Hill, Douglas Hill, Christine Thomas, Colin Read, Peter Beaven.