It's on land incorporated in the Mohaka ki Ahuriri settlement, stemming from a tribunal report in multi-claimants' favour in 2004, but particularly relevant to the WAI 55 Te Whanganui A Orotu (Napier inner harbour) claim, which was subject of some of the tribunal's earliest hearings and which resulted in a report in the claimants' favour in 1995.
Settlement has been in abeyance since the Crown and Mana Ahuriri Trust signed a deed of settlement in 2016.
Mana Ahuriri Holdings was registered on May 28, its two directors and shareholders being Barry Wilson, who has been treasurer of the trust, and property developer Warren Ladbrook, who had been in the past involved in development plans in Hastings.
Wilson declined to comment publicly on the plans yesterday, and no costs or timelines have been revealed.
Briscoe Group was last night also yet to respond to a request for confirmation of its plans for Napier.
Part of the railway block is occupied by the Pak'nSave supermarket, a 7000sq m site which opened in 2004.
Since the closure of the railway yards in the late 1980s, the site has developed as a mainly gravelled area for opportunist free parking. There were at least two attempts to turn it into paid parking, one as a formal commercial venture, the other by a man telling motorists he confronted for payment that he represented the claimants or owners.
Last December and January it also became a dumping ground for abandoned vehicles, an eyesore attracting the dumping of other items such as whiteware and furniture, and rough sleepers.
The dumped vehicle remained in the area for several weeks before being removed by contractors at the request of the Napier City Council in consultation with Land Information NZ, the Government agency responsible for the land since 1994.
In the Treaty settlement it has deferred settlement status, giving the option of purchase within three years of the enacting of settlement legislation, which is yet to take place.
