KEY POINTS:
Triumphalism knew no bounds yesterday as civic leaders announced a framework agreement for the rejuvenation of part of Auckland's waterfront.
"Auckland will finally get the waterfront it truly deserves - one that includes much greater public access, a guaranteed future headland space, and a future iconic public building,"
proclaimed Mike Lee, the Auckland Regional Council chairman. In an equally self-congratulatory vein, Auckland City Mayor Dick Hubbard declared that "we've listened to the people of Auckland, who have clearly said they want us to get on with providing greater access to the water's edge".
If only it were so.
It must be acknowledged that the proposed makeover is a vast improvement on the original proposals for the Tank Farm area, including that of Ports of Auckland, which featured large-scale apartment and office development in a "mixed-use" plan.
Maximising profit was the main purpose of this plan. The public was much unimpressed - understandably so in light of the eyesore this approach had created in many parts of the city.
Mr Hubbard is correct in that, to some degree, this discontent has been addressed.
Most notably, the size of the public park overlooking the harbour has been trebled to 4.25ha, and there will be 2.4km of publicly accessible waterfront. The Tank Farm should, eventually, be transformed into a village with green parks, plazas, boulevards, shops, apartments and restaurants.
This is something that fits the public's expectation of generous access to an inviting place where they can meet and relax - a "people place".
Unfortunately, that invitation has severe limitations. Ring-fenced by this agreement are the Queens, Captain Cook and Marsden wharves. The waterfront on downtown's doorstep will remain out of bounds until the wharves "are no longer needed for commercial port operations", the agreement papers suggest.
Ugly sheds, rows of imported cars and the notorious red fence that cuts them off from the public will continue to characterise the three "finger wharves".
This puts a cloud over the whole redevelopment. No matter how much access to the Tank Farm area is improved, it will always be something of a trek from the city centre.
The finger wharves would always be more accessible, and, if astutely developed, more attractive for those who work in the city. Aucklanders did not agree with the Government's plan to build a stadium there, but that debate produced a virtually unanimous view that the wharves should be thrown open for public use.
Ports of Auckland, it seems, will oppose this to the bitter end. Yet the three wharves have become peripheral to its operations, which, increasingly, are anchored further east, on the Fergusson and Bledisloe terminals.
The port company is wedded to the idea of obtaining the maximum value for this redundant property, and, therefore, wants to drip-feed it on to the market. Oddly, the Auckland Regional Council, its ultimate owner, accepts this argument. Why else would it not have prevailed on the port company to free at least the Queens and Captain Cook wharves for a project of this magnitude?
The absence of change in this crucial area undermines all the trumpeting of a "widespread redevelopment and rejuvenation of the waterfront, from the foot of the Harbour Bridge in the west to Teal Park in the east".
This agreement on issues of design, access, ownership and funding may, indeed, be a significant advance.
But it is not the giant stride that was required to meet public expectations.
