Draft Town Belt Management Plan - Wellington City Council

Wellington Showgrounds, Mt Cook, 1959: under the Wellington City Exhibition Grounds Act
1959, the Wellington City Corporation was authorised to grant the Wellington Show Association a
21-year lease with perpetual right of renewal over approximately 5.6ha (13 acres) of the Town Belt
for use as an exhibition site. The terms of the 1873 vesting Deed were suspended in relation to the
site for as long as this Act or a related lease remained in force.
Land regained
Before the 1970s, a few areas of Town Belt land had come back to the Council, being mainly the
result of administrative ‘tidy ups’ of land left over from roading and similar work, but also
including the addition of about 0.2 ha ( ½ acre) to Tanera Park in 1943 and 6.4719 ha (15 acres, 2
roods, 24 perches) in 1964, when former Town Belt land on Te Ahumairangi Hill (Tinakori Hill),
which had been granted as Māori Reserve and then passed into private hands, was gifted back by
the owner, James Stellin in memory of his war hero son James Stellin, who died in France in 1944.
The gifted land is now Stellin Memorial Park 127 .
In 1973 Action for Environment wrote to the Council suggesting that a new policy be adopted,
under which the Town Belt would be given special status “as more sacrosanct than other reserves”
and that former Town Belt land should be returned 128 . These proposals were, in essence, adopted in
the Council’s first Town Belt Management Policy in 1975.
The Council acknowledged that the “continued existence of the Town Belt despite increasing
demands on the land for other uses from many different agencies is vitally important to
Wellington City” 129 . It set out to establish existing boundaries, and to obtain Town Belt land that
had been alienated “to gain a Town Belt more resembling the original land area.” The policy also
stated that if any Town Belt land were to be taken for other uses, then the Council would seek land
of equal value, which would be given the same Town Belt status.
In 1983, when Action for the Environment investigated and found that some of the land taken for
the Rongotai housing relocations in 1952 remained undeveloped 130 , the Council of the day decided
not to buy it back for reinstatement in the Town Belt. However, in June 1980, an area named the
Vice-Regal Play Area, on the upper part of Government House land adjoining the Ewart Hospital,
was handed back to the city and planted as part of Arbor Day activities. Return of other land, was
slower to occur, complicated by the creation of State-owned enterprises that were reluctant to let
inherited – and valuable – former Town Belt land go, even if no longer used for the purposes taken.
Furthermore, the status of Town Belt land in relation to the Wellington Treaty Claim was being
considered by the Waitangi Tribunal.
While return of legally alienated land was one issue, so too, was the use of Town Belt land by
neighbouring property owners. In 1988, the Council set about inspecting the Town Belt
boundaries. An up-to-date register of all encroachments was compiled; some formalised under
licence, others informal and historic in nature. Collectively, more than 2ha of Town Belt land was
found to be in use for private purposes.
The 1995 Management Plan introduced policies to systematically address the encroachments. It
also reiterated the 1975 policy to seek the return of alienated former Town Belt land where
possible, with the intention of introducing a Bill to Parliament “to regularise the legal status and
unite the lands managed as Town Belt.” The Council developed its intentions in more detail in the
Town Belt Reinstatement Policy, 1998 and undertook preparatory work on a Bill.
In 2000, 18.63ha of the land held by Telecom on Te Ahumairangi Hill (formerly Tinakori Hill) was
returned to the Council; in 2002, the 3.21 ha Chest Hospital site was returned; and, in 2012, a
further 4.7 ha of Telecom (now Chorus) land was returned.
127 WCCF00001: 1147:31/433, Pt 1 Reserve: Stellin Memorial Park, Orangi Kaupapa Road, WCA.
128 WCCF 00001:1905:50/830 Pt 3, Town Belt (general file), (Deed 188), 1970-1974, WCA
129 WCCF 00001:1905:50/830 Pt 4, Town Belt (General). Management Policy: Wellington Town Belt, WCA
130 WCCF. 00001:1905:50.830 Pt 4, Town Belt (general file), (Deed 188), 1974-1983, WCA
Draft Town Belt Management Plan October 2012
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