Villagers battle growing threat of urban sprawl

Zoe Yozin has lived in Swanson for 60 years and wants the village to keep its rural character. Picture / Glenn Jeffrey

When Zoe Yozin came to live in the foothills of the Waitakere Ranges as a 21-year-old bride, it was a place of poultry farms, orchards and gardens.

"Everyone grew something to send to the markets in Auckland, even if it was just beans packed in a shoebox, and they loaded up the carrier's truck," Mrs Yozin recalls.

It was 1945 and her husband, Milan, had planted a small vineyard so that winemaking could eventually boost the income from his fruit trees and market garden.

Mrs Yozin says she has many more neighbours in Swanson these days.

"They come to enjoy living in a rural village. We are one of the few farmers left."

Her husband died 30 years ago and she stayed in the family's 1914 villa, built from local kauri. Her daughter Rosalie runs an organic vineyard and market garden on the old 4ha farm.

The business still uses the shop and packing shed which Milan Yozin built from concrete blocks he moulded himself and sheathed in plaster, like the buildings of his native Dalmatia.

The eye-catching building has another role - as an information centre in a long-running battle against what they fear is a council plan to introduce "mass subdivision" to Swanson.

Rosalie Yozin said residents feared the creep of urban-style housing subdivisions would ruin the village's rural character.

The metropolitan urban limit had protected rural Auckland from urban sprawl. Now 500 residents had signed a petition against any move to push that limit out to include a kiwifruit orchard near the Swanson Railway Station, where commuters travel 25km by train to downtown Auckland. The orchard land, known as Penihana, is owned by developer Neil International.

Rosalie Yozin said a proposed change to the district plan flagged Penihana as an urban growth area, which allowed apartments around train stations.

The Waitakere City Council was trying to clear the way for the Penihana subdivision in a change to its management of city growth policy.

The Yozins said few people knew about the proposal yet they had only until the end of this month to make their views known to the council. The proposal is for a staged growth and Penihana's turn is 10 to 20 years away.

Councillor Penny Hulse, who lives in Swanson, said she regretted that a section of the community mistrusted the council.

"We never said we were covering it in a mass subdivision."

Mediation to produce a Penihana concept development plan had failed. The council would look again at a concept plan in 2011, when it would have a clearer view of Swanson's future.