A hard road for the Hilton
28/06/2006 12:00:00 a.m.
The proposed Hilton Hotel on the Outer-T of Queen’s Wharf.
THE Wellington Regional Council, Greater Wellington, has added its voice to those opposed to the development of the Hilton Hotel on the Outer-T of Queen’s Wharf.
Greater Wellington recommends the proposal be declined because it will have significant adverse effects on the environment.
Al Cross, acting consents manager for Greater Wellington, says the Outer-T is a significant public site.
"Therefore we are taking great care over this application with regard to environmental aspects such as design, visual amenity, wind, noise and traffic effects," Cross says.
Greater Wellington believes building a hotel on the site would contravene the principles of the Resource Management Act, the Wellington Regional Policy Statement, the Regional Coastal Plan, the Wellington City District Plan and the Wellington Waterfront Framework.
Key issues include pedestrian access, increased wind effects, the ability of large vessels to berth at Queen’s Wharf, and the loss of jetties at the wharf. In addition, the proposal may erode the historical heritage of the wharf.
A resource consent hearing on the proposal starts on July 3 and is scheduled to last at least four weeks.
Of the 994 submissions Greater Wellington has received, 834 are opposed, 155 are in support, three are conditional, and two are neutral. Should the Hearing Committee decline the proposal to build the hotel, a competition will be held to decide how the Outer-T could otherwise be developed, says Ian Pike, CEO of Wellington Waterfront Limited.
"Suggestions have included a winter garden, I don’t know what a winter garden actually is, but it has been suggested," Pike says.
The commissioners hearing the resource consent application are Wellington Regional Councillors Chris Laidlaw and Chris Turver, iwi representative Miria Pomare, and independent commissioners David McMahon and Stuart Kinnear.
