Acclaimed filmmaker Gaylene Preston and neighbours Ralph Highnam and Dave Woods share their objections to the plans. Video / Ethan Manera
Plans for a luxury six-storey apartment block in Wellington’s Mt Victoria face growing opposition from neighbours.
One of those neighbours, famous filmmaker Dame Gaylene Preston, says her community “is going to be decimated” if it goes ahead.
Developer Mark Quinn says he has empathy for the neighbours but believes the development will help move the city forward.
A high-end residential development that would be the first of its kind under Wellington’s new planning rules is facing growing opposition from neighbours, with an acclaimed filmmaker joining the fight against it.
Plans were unveiled for Mayfair, a six-storey apartment block, late last year.
It would see a historic Wellington estate demolished and replaced with 32 luxury residences as well as a large heated outdoor swimming pool, gym, sauna, residents lounge, “summer house”, and underground carparking.
Developer Mark Quinn said District Plan changes, which allowed the area to be built up to 22 metres high, had increased their options for development in the city.
But a group of neighbours, many of whom live on the shared driveway leading up to the site of the proposed development, are mobilising against the plans.
A proposed luxury apartment development in Wellington's Mt Victoria boasts an outdoor heated pool, multi-million dollar penthouses, and an underground carpark.
The Westbourne estate currently occupies the site. Photo / Ray White.
One nearby resident who has joined the fight against Mayfair is renowned filmmaker Dame Gaylene Preston who fears her “community is going to be decimated” if it goes ahead.
Preston invited the Herald to the quiet street this week to discuss her objection to the plans, where nearly a dozen other neighbours emerged to share their views.
A group of Mt Victoria residents are opposing the Mayfair development. Photo / Ethan Manera
“It won’t be such a lovely place to live,” she said.
The removal of earth from the site, as well as construction disruption and more cars in the street from the extra dwellings are among Preston’s main concerns.
Preston said she agrees with the intention of the new District Plan, but not the way it has been applied to this proposal.
Dame Gaylene Preston fears her “community is going to be decimated” if the development goes ahead. Photo / Supplied
“I think we need more people, of course it makes sense to have people in town and taking the bus and walking about and less cars and low carbon - this isn’t what‘s happening here.
“The lights are going to be going out on Mt Victoria, it‘s gonna turn into a ghostly, car-clogged environment.
“The council are considering consenting the existing plans while leaving it to the 17 people who live here to actually work with lawyers to sort out what is considered to be a civil matter while we know developers have deep pockets, it‘s really unfair,” she said.
Recent planning changes mean parts of Wellington's Mt Victoria can be built up to 22 metres. Photo / Ross Setford
“I’m spending my time reading property law from 2007″, Ralph Highnam, who lives two doors down from the site, told the Herald.
Highnam, who was Wellingtonian of the Year in 2022 for his work in breast cancer research, has a number of issues with the development - including its height, the potential blocking of sunlight for neighbouring houses, the number of planned carparks on the property, disruption during the building process, the unaffordability of the apartments and changes to the private road.
Mayfair's proposal includes an underground carpark. Photo / supplied.
“We’re not opposed to development, we want to see appropriate and respectful development,” he said.
The current one-lane shared driveway leading up to the site would have its footpath and cabbage trees removed and a judder bar installed, Highnam said.
Neighbours are opposing changes to the shared driveway leading up to the Mayfair development in Mt Victoria. Photo / supplied.
He said the six-storey building would “absolutely shield and wreck the lives”, of neighbours.
“My little girl walks down here every day to school, we’re gonna do whatever it takes to keep my kid and Willie’s kids and the other people that live along here safe.”
He said they have “no choice” but to take the issue as far as court.
Dave Woods owns the property next door to the proposed Mayfair development, which he rents out, and said his “life’s on hold” due to the uncertainty.
He said the proposed development has made his tenants “nervous” and he’s had to “drop the rent to keep them happy”.
Another neighbour, who did not want her full name used, said she only recently moved to Wellington, but believes there is something “deeply dodgy” going on.
She proudly wore a badge she had made as a piece of merchandise for the campaign against the development, showing the face of the late former Green Party leader Jeanette Fitzsimons, posing the curious question “What would Jeanette think?”
One Mt Victoria resident has made a badge questioning what a former Green party leader would make of the controversial luxury development.
She said she had never supported the Green Party but believed Fitzsimons had a lot of mana.
The group of neighbours this week had a community meeting to “demand that Wellington City Council publicly notify the resource consent application for the proposed Mayfair tower block”.
Quinn said last year he had specifically asked the council that neighbours be included as notified parties to the consent application, which he said will “allow them to be heard”.
In response to the new objections of neighbours, Quinn told the Herald he has “real empathy for the emotional aspects” of their concerns.
“The timing for opposing that change was when the district plan was going through consultation, hearings and any objection periods. There was a judicial review of the council’s decision to approve the district plan, which was heard by the court and which wasn’t successful.
“That outcome isn’t one that pleases everyone of course, but with any democratic process, there will always be those who struggle with the outcomes reached by that process,” Quinn said.
Responding to concerns regarding the shared accessway, he said he’s been working with “two senior traffic engineers to ensure that what is proposed is safe, appropriate and properly thought out”.
The building’s proposed 28 lot underground carpark is “proposed to reflect the way that people live”, Quinn said, and would include electric vehicle charging capacity and bicycle parking.
“Construction can be disruptive, we are cognisant of that and have been working with the proposed contractor CMP to develop strategies to minimise disruption, as we genuinely want to ensure as far as practicable that any disruption is kept to a minimum.
“Change in any neighbourhood is confronting, however it is necessary to move forward and the district plan went through a long and detailed process to get to where it is.
“We were not proponents of that, we are simply looking to move our city in the direction that has been laid out through that process,” he said.
A Wellington City Council spokesperson said a decision on the public-notification of consent was still “a couple of weeks away at least”.
Ethan Manera is a multimedia journalist based in Wellington. He joined NZME in 2023 and is interested in local issues, politics and property in the capital. Ethan is always on the lookout for a story and can be emailed atethan.manera@nzme.co.nz.
