Heritage precinct moves another step closer

A Combined Wairarapa Planning Committee recently adopted a proposal to extend Greytown’s Historic Heritage Precinct.  The proposal has now moved a step closer with the public notification of the proposal. 

Greytown’s Main Street boasts many original colonial buildings housing trendy cafes, boutiques, art galleries and antique shops.  Its heritage charm is a real drawcard for visitors and a source of pride for locals.

Only a small part of Greytown’s Main Street has protection as a Historic Heritage Precinct.  In an earlier post I talked about a proposal to extend the precinct a block north and a block south.  On 23 September 2011 the Committee heard from four submitters who generally support the proposal, and one who opposes the proposal entirely.  The Greytown Community Heritage Trust, of which I am chair, was one of the four submitters in favour.

In a decision dated 13 October 2011 The Committee resolved to adopt Plan Change No 4 – Greytown Historic Heritage Precinct Extension.  The decision was publicly notified on 8 December 2011.  Any person who made a submission now has the right to appeal the decision on the proposal to the Environment Court.  Any appeal must be lodged within 30 days of service of the notice of decision.


I think an appeal is unlikely in this case.  So the Plan Change will become operative early 2012.


Photo courtesy of US Embassy New Zealand and author Geoff Walker under Creative Commons licence.

Council extends heritage precinct

A Combined Wairarapa Planning Committee recently adopted a proposal to extend Greytown’s Historic Heritage Precinct.

Greytown’s Main Street boasts many original colonial buildings housing trendy cafes, boutiques, art galleries and antique shops.  Its heritage charm is a real drawcard for visitors and a source of pride for locals.

Only a small part of Greytown’s Main Street has protection as a Historic Heritage Precinct.  In an earlier post I talked about a proposal to extend the precinct a block north and a block south.  On 23 September 2011 the Committee heard from four submitters who generally support the proposal, and one who opposes the proposal entirely.  The Greytown Community Heritage Trust, of which I am chair, was one of the four submitters in favour.

In a decision dated 13 October 2011 The Committee resolved to adopt Plan Change No 4 – Greytown Historic Heritage Precinct Extension.  The decision will now be publicly notified.  The plan change will be effective from the date of public notification.

I think it’s appropriate to acknowledge the foresight of those who originally made submissions on the Wairarapa Combined District Plan back in August 2006.  And the three Councils who have taken those submissions on board.

Recognising Greytown’s heritage

In an earlier blog post I talked about Greytown, my hometown.  Our Main Street boasts many original colonial buildings housing trendy cafes, boutiques, art galleries and antique shops.  Its heritage charm is a real drawcard for visitors and a source of pride for locals.

Yet only a small part of Greytown’s Main Street has protection as a Historic Heritage Precinct.  Last week a proposal to extend it a block north and a block south moved a step closer to fruition.  Further detail of the proposal is available in Proposed Plan Change 4 together with a map of the affected area.

The Combined Wairarapa Planning Committee heard from four submitters who generally support the proposal, and one who opposes the proposal entirely.  The Greytown Community Heritage Trust was one of those four submitters.  I talked about our submission in an earlier blog post.

Summaries of the submissions are set out in the agenda circulated before the meeting.

The Officers’ Report prepared before the hearing noted general support within the submissions for the plan change and summarised the matters raised.

Looking at the submissions made and the Officers’ report I think the plan change will go through.

A heritage perspective on Christchurch

The recent earthquakes in Christchurch left hundreds dead, thousands homeless, and tens of thousands financially affected.  Without detracting from what is clearly a human tragedy, the loss of heritage buildings is emerging as yet another tragedy.

Last week the Greytown Community Heritage Trust hosted our annual history lecture.  The guest speaker this year was Win Clark.  Win is an engineer and executive officer for the New Zealand Society for Earthquake Engineering.  He is a regular visitor to Christchurch where he is involved in assessing the damage and providing advice about reconstruction and earthquake strengthening.

The New Zealand Historic Places Trust maintains a Register of Historic Places that represents the national schedule of New Zealand's treasured heritage places.  Historic places are further divided into two categories.  Category I status is given to places of 'special or outstanding historical or cultural heritage significance or value'.  Category II status is given to places of 'historical or cultural heritage significance or value'.

Christchurch has a broad distribution of Category I and Category II damaged buildings.  Surviving buildings tended to have four characteristics:

• Regular form
• Good materials
• Good workmanship
• Good maintenance

He gave one example of a row of buildings that had suffered extensive damage.  The ground floors were tenanted by low-rent retailers.  The upper floors were vacant.  The building owner(s) had allowed the buildings to fall into disrepair.  Maintenance had not been kept up.

Another example he gave was a pair of semi-detached residential dwellings.  The owners had removed internal walls to open living areas up.  The walls were not load bearing so the owners were perfectly entitled to remove them.  However, during the February earthquakes, the internal walls inhibited lateral movement in a way that was not anticipated.  Those dwellings that still had the internal walls fared better than those that didn’t.

One building that escaped largely undamaged was a fire station.  The owners had installed internal bracing a few years earlier.

The fate of other heritage buildings is entirely in the hands of their owners.  In each case the issue is one of economic viability.  There needs to be an owner who is both willing and financially able to save the building.  In some cases a building owner is keen to maintain the original building façade and build behind it.  However, insurers are not willing to insure the composite structure.  And owners don’t want the liability in case someone else is injured in a future earthquake.

Although I understand the financial pressures on building owners, it is a pity to see these heritage buildings lost.


Photo courtesy of author Geof Wilson under Creative Commons licence.

Preserving Greytown's Main Street

In a previous blog I talked about the Greytown Heritage Trust of which I am chair.  Today we made a submission on a proposal to extend the Greytown Historic Heritage Precinct.

The Wairarapa is governed locally by three different territorial authorities.  These are the Masterton District Council, Carterton District Council and the South Wairarapa District Council.  A few years ago the three Councils worked together to implement a Wairarapa Combined District Plan.  This District Plan was publicly notified on 26 August 2006.

It is well recognised that Greytown’s Main Street is one area of the Wairarapa that has significant historic heritage.  This heritage arises as a consequence of the combined character and values associated with a number of the buildings and structures on the street.  Many of these individually may not be regarded as significant.  But collectively they are quite striking.

Only a small part of Greytown’s Main Street enjoys protection as a Historic Heritage Precinct.

Submitters on the District Plan back in 2006 requested extension of the Greytown Historic Heritage Precinct.  They were concerned about the loss of character and historic heritage of those areas of Main Street not protected by the Historic Heritage Precinct.  They highlighted recent developments as examples of the degradation that may occur in the future.

Representatives of the Councils agreed that additional controls are needed along Greytown’s Main Street to protect the streetscape and residential character of the area.  They also noted that the existing Design guidelines are applicable only to commercial properties.  They need to be reviewed to make them applicable for residential purposes.

The three Councils propose a change to the Wairarapa Combined District Plan to extend the Greytown Historic Heritage Precinct .  The change is described in Proposed Plan Change No 4 together with a map of the proposed Heritage Precinct Extension.

The Greytown Heritage Trust supports this proposal.

Greytown Heritage Trust

I live in New Zealand’s first planned inland town.  In New Zealand being first is just a matter of using enough adjectives.  The town was first surveyed by the Small Farms Association in 1853.  It consisted of 120 one acre sections, 60 on each side of Main Street.  The original concept was for each purchaser to have a town section of 1 acre and a 40 acre farm block nearby.

In March 1854 the first six settlers arrived on foot from Wellington over the Rimutaka mountain range.  They had with them 4 bullocks carrying all their possessions.  They got cracking building shelters and small cottages.  Within five years there were more substantial buildings, shops, hotels and larger houses.

The railway arrived in the 1870’s.  Frequent river flooding meant that the railway line didn’t pass through Greytown.  The railway line passed instead through Woodside where the river was more manageable and less prone to flooding.  Woodside is about 5 km from Greytown.  There was a separate railway line from Woodside station into Greytown.

The lack of direct railway access meant that Greytown was no longer the pre-eminent town in the region.  Very little new construction went on from 1920 to 1970, while the other towns nearby developed and modernised. This meant that Greytown’s original colonial buildings and established trees were left largely untouched.

The 1990s saw a rebirth of Greytown and appreciation of its charms.  Old buildings have been, with some exceptions, sensitively upgraded and put to new purposes.  Main Street now houses trendy cafes, boutiques, art galleries and antique shops.

The 2006 census records the population of the town as 2,001.  This represents an increase of 3 people since the 2001 census.  My wife and I have three children born in 2003, 2004 and 2006.  So that makes us directly responsible for the population increase.  We’ve done our bit.  It’s now up to others to increase the town population.

I am currently chair of the Greytown Heritage Trust.  We are a charitable trust established with the simple aim of working with developers and local authorities to maintain Greytown’s colonial charm.  It’s a bit of a balancing act.  We don’t want to see a collection of relics.  Sympathetic development needs to be encouraged.

Tonight we had our first meeting with our board members elected at our recent AGM.  We allocated roles and responsibilities for our organisation and mapped out some goals for the coming year.  As well as chairperson, secretary and treasurer, we now have formal roles/subcommittees for:

• Property management
• Historical research
• Membership
• Heritage advisor
• History lecture organisation
• Website management
• Public relations
• Special projects

We have an active and enthusiastic committee.  It’s going to be a good year!