By WAYNE THOMPSON
A bold proposal to set an English-style village in common parkland near the North Shore is encouraged in the proposed Rodney District Plan.
The plan creates the Weiti Forest Park special zone to allow the proposal for 150 households to be built in clusters of five to nine homes.
Some
clusters are to form around a village green and community club, while others are scattered through commonly owned pasture, ponds, wetland, eucalyptus forest and regenerating bush.
The proposed development is for farm land between the Northern Motorway and the coastal Weiti Forest.
A village is not permitted under the present district plan's rules for rural cluster developments.
The district council sees forest parks as welcome alternatives to usual lifestyle subdivisions in the rural buffer between metropolitan Auckland and the Hibiscus Coast.
The council's manager of forward planning, Peter Vari, said several inquiries had been received about creating forest parks since the plan was released for public comment last Tuesday. "People are looking at having horses and grape vines, with common ownership of the farm."
The Okura landowners, Green and McCahill Group, would not comment on the village proposal.
Mr Vari said a more precise subdivision proposal would be needed in any application to proceed with the development.
Sources said the development would be some years away, because it would depend on being linked to the motorway by the proposed Weiti Crossing to Whangaparaoa.
The council will not decide whether to build the crossing until at least the middle of next year.
The proposed district plan draws the line at lifestyle block sizes below 2ha on the metropolitan fringe at Dairy Flat, Redvale, Coatesville and Riverhead. Sites close to Kaukapakapa, Helensville, Kumeu and Huapai are generally restricted to 1.5ha.
Rural Rodney had a combined population of 30,800 in 1996 and the plan prepares to take on a further 20,000 people in 50 years.
By then, the whole district is tipped to have a population of 177,000, compared with the present 73,800.
