Heritage policy only skin deep, say critics

The Deloitte Centre incorporates the Art Deco facade of the Jean Batten building. Photo / Paul Estcourt

Property Council chief executive Connal Townsend has criticised the system designed to encourage historic building retention.

In a speech to be presented to this week's workshop on heritage building incentives, Townsend said one of the consequences of the system was "facadism" - the retention of facades embedded in the walls of much more modern buildings made of different materials.

He named Brookfield Multiplex's $200 million Deloitte Centre on Auckland's Queen St as an example.

"New Zealand has too many examples of retained facades with blanked-out windows concealing car parks embedded in the base of a tall modern office tower. The new Jean Batten Place development barely works," Townsend said.

Facadism was just one of the "unintended and perverse consequences of poorly-constructed incentives and compensation policies," he said.

Other consequences included:

* Out-of-character additions grafted on to a heritage building.

* Retention of shabby buildings which are copies of designs from overseas.

* Undermining the ability of a city to foster reinvestment in buildings.

Brookfield demolished most of the Jean Batten building in Auckland's CBD, kept parts of its exterior and incorporated that into the new tower for tenants the BNZ and Deloitte. Some of the interior heritage aspects of the old building have been recreated including old ceiling features. Parts of what remains of the exterior have been restored including fixtures like lights and a flagpole. A reconciliation wall was completed a few weeks ago on the Shortland St side of the new development. That sports a series of fins in a nod to the old building, not deemed worthy of full protection.

The new Deloitte Centre stands almost directly opposite the BNZ tower at 125 Queen St which also had its facade retained in the 1980s when the high-rise glass tower was built behind it. That facade dates back to the 1880s when construction of the original building on Queen St was undertaken and the neoclassical Greek revival facade was designed by Leonard Terry of Melbourne.

Townsend called for much higher grants and said this would be the most effective scheme to reward property owners for keeping historic buildings.

"Existing New Zealand incentives are inadequate and minimal by overseas standards. Grants offer the most cost-effective form of assistance," Townsend said.

Incentives and various forms of compensation should not encourage facadism, he said. This was "an affront to both heritage values and the value of contemporary design. It is the unfortunate result of ill-considered regulations which have failed to assess properly the heritage and design value of retaining facades".

He called for historic building owners to get grants or loans which he said had flexibility, could be directed towards the most needy and deserving buildings and measured by being subjected to annual budgeting processes. Peter Dowell, chairman of the Historic Places Trust's Wellington branch, presented a paper which also criticised the system.

"The current central and local government policies haven't worked over the last 30 years in stimulating investment back into our heritage buildings as an investment class. This is a lesson," Dowell said.

The trust has 7215 entries on its register. Of those, 5000 were historic buildings and the rest were wahi tapu, landscapes and archaeological sites, Dowell said.

Councils have 13,000 listed places on district plans.

"One could assume there could be another 10,000 potentially earthquake-prone buildings to add to the list," he said.