Manager Shona Willis’ desire to upgrade and protect Dean’s Bush is unmistakable over coffee in Riccarton House. The trust board is seeking to raise $2.4 million to protect the bush for decades to come, upgrade the visitor experience and celebrate its relationship to Ngai Tahu.
It is also seeking to create a buffer zone around the bush to protect it from the effects of housing intensification.
But documents she has provided to The Wigram show there is a significant level of opposition to the Riccarton Bush Trust’s efforts to protect it from housing intensification. Their opponents include Kāinga Ora.
The Riccarton Bush Trust’s battle to protect Pūtaringamotu/Dean’s Bush from housing intensification has begun.
A key element of its 4 May submission, and one that trust Manager Shona Willis emphasised in her interview with The Wigram in the colonial-era Riccarton Bush House was “the re-insertion of the 10m buffer”, that would be “measured from the foot of the predator proof fence and subject to the existing exceptions.”
The trust would also like Council to add an “interface area” around the bush that includes “the imposition of a 8m height limit, “retention of the 35% site coverage rule for the RS zone”, and that the trust board be told about resource consent applications that involve “non-compliance with the above standards and the matters of discretion at” relating to special consideration of the impact that new builds could have on some of the trees in the bush.
Opposing Forces
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