Legal battle likely over refuse station?

Press, 27 February 1980, Page 6

Legal battle likely over refuse station?

A legal battle may result from the Waimairi County Council’s decision last evening to dispute the authority of the Christchurch Metropolitan Refuse Disposal Committee.

The council decided that the committee did not have the power to serve a requirement of work on it, seeking designation of land in Styx Mill Road for use as a refuse transfer station. Mr D. B. Rich, chairman of Waimairi County, is also a member of the Refuse Disposal Committee. He said last evening that the committee had not yet discussed Waimairi’s decision. “We will have to consider the matter and get legal advice on it. We will then have to decide whether we wish to persist with plans for this site,” he said.

It had, of course, chosen the Styx Mill Road site in the first place because it was the most suitable, Mr Rich said.

If the committee decided to fight the council’s decision it could challenge it on a legal basis in the Supreme Court, or on a town-planning basis before the Town and Country Planning Appeal Authority.

Another alternative was that the committee could just ignore the council’s decision and proceed with its plans. This, in turn, could possibly cause Waimairi to initiate legal steps to stop it, said Mr Rich.

He said that last evening’s decision might please objectors to the proposal, but it could force other choices upon the Refuse Disposal Committee.

These choices, which the

committee had not chosen to follow, might have even less appeal to potential objectors. “If we. wish to proceed with our plans quickly we will have to choose another site which may or may not be subject to the same procedures as that in Styx Mill Road.”

Mr Rich said that it would be possible to build a transfer station in an industrial zone without going through these procedures. Such a site might be much closer to I housing than the site rejected by Waimairi last I evening. - * “We have to get. rid of I refuse and we are running out of time to develop this scheme,” he said. “We have been told that this is the best scheme, but we are encountering problems getting it under way.”