£3700 Claim Argued In Land Valuation Court

Press, Volume C, Issue 29588, 10 August 1961, Page 10

£3700 Claim Argued In Land Valuation Court

A claim for £3700 compensation for the injurious effect of three pylons and a 06,000-voit transmission line, from Egliirton to Bromley, crossing his 41 acre farming and sub-divisional property iat Hornby was made by Goridon Alexander Skerton before the North Canterbury Land Valuation Committee yesterday. Hie claim by Skerton, a farmer, of 467 Main South road, was made against the Minister of Works. The committee, comprising Messrs A. P. Blair, S.M. (chairman), and L. S. Maskew and B. H. Tosswill, adjourned the bearing until to- - morrow, when evidence will | be completed. I It was agreed by counsel I engaged that the land had I suffered injurious effect but I counsel differed on the I method, and consequently I the amount, of assessing the I effect. It was said during | the hearing that the claim ' was the first of its kind to be heard in Christchurch. I Mr G. H. Gould appeared ■ for Skerton, as claimant, and Mr P. T. Mahon for the Minister of Works, as respondent. I Mr Gould said that Skerton's land was six miles from Cathedral square. It was on the left-hand side of the road, about half a mile past the shops over the railway crossing at Hornby. It ■was light farming land and was classed as residential under the undisclosed scheme lof the local authority. The iblock was capable of being divided into 166 or more residential lots. No Subdivision Plan The Ministry of Works entered on the land to erect the power pylons in May, 1958, and this was the date on which compensation must be fixed. At that date, no subdivision plan had been lodged in the land transfer office and no scheme of subdivision had been put before the local authority. “Tn my submission, the land must therefore be dealt with, for the purposes of compensation, as a block of land with subdivisions] potential,” Mr Gould said. The proper method of assessing the amount of compensation, counsel contended, was to ascertain the value of the land as a block without the transmission lines and deduct from that the value of the land with transmission lines.. A hypothetical scheme of subdivision for the land had been made by surveyors, and this showed that the transmission lines were supported on three pylons and that the lines passed over 22 sections. “An actual scheme plan has also been lodged with the land transfer office, and this gives 202 sections. For the purposes of this claim, however, the hypothetical scheme giving 166 sections will be used, and this is more favourable to the respondent. The scheme plan was approved by the local authority in July, 1960,” counsel said. Gross Realisation The gross realisation from the block, at 32-perch sections selling from £450 to £550, would be £91,100, Mr Gould said. The committee had to determine if £450 to £550 a section was a reasonable price for sections of that kind. Amounts to be deducted from the gross realisation included legal and commission expenses, profit and risk allowances, reading, sewering, kerbing, channelling work, advertising, rates and interest on capital outlay. Michael John Wood Davis, a surveyor, said he had drawn up the plan for the hypothetical scheme, showing 166 sections. Cross-examined by Mr Mahon. Davis said that the local authority had allowed the minimum area of 32perch sections for unsewered residences to be reduced to 24 perches because a combined sewer treatment scheme for the whole subdivision had been proposed. Mr Mahon produced a subdivision plan which the witness agreed he had drawn for a Mr Forsyth, who had purchased the block of land from Skerton in 1959. Forsyth subsequently decided not to buy Skerton’s land. Lines Down Road This pdan showed a road which followed the path of the transmission line over the property. The transmission lines would pass over only two sections in the block. If the Crown took these two sections for reserve, the lines would pass over none of the sections. Davis said that Forsyth decided not to proceed with that plan and changed his surveyor. The main method of financing housing subdivisions of this kind in the last three years had been through loans from the State Advances Corporation and. the insurance companies leasehold schemes. Davis said to Mr Mahon's question. Davis agreed that if a centre line for another transmission line across the block of land in the future had been proclaimed this would be a factor influencing the corporation and insurance companies lending money for the purchase and subdivision of the land. Re-examined by Mr Gould. Davis said the transmission line itself would have been 2ft from the front of sections in the plan he drew for Forsyth. He did not know whether the local authority would approve of a road fol- ' lowing power pvlons. “It was a try-on,” Davis said. Vainer’s Evidence Cyril Edward Hoy, a valuer and estate agent, said he considered that the block of land was an ideal one for subdivision. It was at Hornby, the biggest industrial area in the South Island. The land had been zoned as residential in 1958. Three offers had been made for the land, the third in June. 1960. AU offers were above the value he himself placed on the land, so if

he considered there was a good demand for it. A sale of eight 32-perch sections in the same area as

Skerton’s block had realised £525 each early in 1959. the witness said. These sections, he thought, would not be quite as good as the ones in Skerton’s block.

“I consider the value of Skerton’s land, as a block, has been reduced by £3430 by the transmission lines,” Hoy said. To Mr Mahon, the witness said the assessable depreciation in the Skerton block was where the high-tension transmission line crossed the sections. If the block was subdivided so that the lines ran down a public street there would still be a degree of detriment. Householders would have to pass under the lines to get to their properties. First Case To Mr Mahon, Hoy said he had not previously made a valuation for compensation purposes because of injurious effect of power lines crossing it. He knew of no other case in Christchurch in which a block of land had been so valued. Referred to rates of sections in the area of Skerton’s land sold about 1958, Hoy said the prices did not shake his figure. He had valued Skerton’s land at £430 a section and thought this -was very conservative. Forsyth, a year after the Ministry of Works put pylons on Skerton’s land, had bought 12 acres across the road. Mr Mahon: Did you know that Forsyth in December, 1959, paid £670 an acre for land with transmission lines on it, and in November, 1959. paid £545 an acre for land across the road for land with, out transmission lines in it? Hoy: Yes. But I valued the land without lines at £445 a section and Skerton’s land with lines crossing it at £430 a section. Do you agree that a man buying land for a large subdivision would not give much weight to power lines crossing it?—He would assess what value he would lose because of the lines when selling the section. Doesn’t the answer in the final case depend on the manner in which the land is subdivided?—-It must have a bearing. If the lines do not interfere with the sections the loss would be smaller? —It is all a matter of degree. If you put high-tension wires down the middle of McDougall avenue. . . . But this is not McDougall avenue? No. but hightension wires swinging in the breeze are not attractive anywhere. You agree that this claim for £3700 on 42 acres works out at £BB an acre?—Yes. Chairman's Question To Mr Biair, Hoy said he had never heard of any local body being approached to allow transmission lines to run down a proposed road He doubted whether any local body would allow it. Mr Mahon told the Court he understood the position was that the chief surveyor for the Ministry of Works had the final say, though he invited the, comment of the local authorities. Mr Blair: The chief surveyor could allow a road with lines and pylons down it, no matter what the local authority thought? Mr Mahon: Yes, sir, as I understand it To Mr Mahon, the witness said he knew of no case in which a section had been shown to have lost value because of the mere proximity of transmission lines. Such loss would be, in Christchurch, pure conjecture, but he maintained there was a general detriment to the property because of proximity of power lines. file witness referred to the sale of three sections in the Gfegan block, Bryndwr, by the State Advances Corporation. The corporation, he said, had sold sections without transmission lines at £775, where the line crossed the rear of sections at £725. and where the pylon base took up land at the rear of the sections at £625. Skerton gave evidence that his block of land had not been sold to Forsyth. The sale had fallen through. He still owned the land and three weeks ago had refused an offer of £29.000 from the Paramount group of building companies. He wanted £35,000 for the block. Respondent’s Case Opening the case for the respondent, Mr Mahon said it was agreed that the transmission line had had some injurious effect on the land and on potential subdivisional value. But the respondent could not agree with the claimant's method of determining what was the value in money of that injurious effect. There was no subdivision scheme in existence at the time of entry of the respondent on the claimant's land, and the respondent said that the claimant could not now put forward any specific subdivision plan and claim compensation on that basis. In fact, there were three subdivision plans before the Court. In one, the line would cross 22 sections and the compensation would, accordingly, be substantial. In tlie third, the line ran down a road and crossed only 10 sections, so the compensation would be much lower. "The respondent’s valuers have taken a strip across the property that the line follows and made it 29ft wide—16ft on either side of the lines, which occupy 9ft. This gives an area of one acre and a-quarter and the respondent’s valuers sav that this land, and the twro sections crossed by the lines’ entry and exit of the block is the only land suffering injunous effect from the transmission line. 7 aluers have valued tnis land as a farming block and its potential value of subdivision, and written down the value of land affected by the transmission

line by 50 per cent, to compensate for the injurious effect.” Mr Mahon said. He submitted that this i was the method by which compensation should be asi sessed. He said that if the : claimant obtained oompenI satiou on a subdivision plan iin which 22 sections were . crossed by the line there : was nothing to prevent i either the claimant or a subsequent purchaser from with--1 drawing that plan and sub- . stituting another in which i fewer sections, or none at all, suffered injurious effect. Mr Mahon said the responi dent would call technical evidence concerning the : transmission line and the i proposed second line and : evidence from Crown vali uers.

John Keith Hearfield, transmission line engineer of the Ministry of Works. Christchurch, cross-examined by Mr Gould, said that ifpresent developments continued a second transmission line going across the block would soon be required.