Rural houses inevitable, ruling says

Press, 22 September 1983, Page 7

Rural houses inevitable, ruling says

Rural part-time fanning zones would “inevitably” have houses built on them, so a call from the Canterbury United Council to restrict housing on units in the Green Belt would have no long-term effect on planning, the Planning Tribunal has ruled. The council appealed to the Planning Tribunal to change a provision in the Paparua and Eyre county councils’ reviewed rural scheme after the counties had refused to change it. Houses on part-time farm units in the rural area should be built only if it was essential to the land use, the council argued. The counties’ provision required the house to be an accessory, but not an essential. In his decision, Judge Treadwell, who chaired the hearing in July, said that the council’s proposal would lead farmers only in one particular direction so that they could build a house on the unit. “After that objective is achieved, the landowner is at liberty to change his land use in such a manner as he thinks fit,” the decision said. Paparua’s policy in encouraging intensive agriculture was a wise one, and people who wanted to build a house on the property should not be unnecessarily hampered by ordinances

which would place a heavy burden on them. “We do not consider that a landowner should be faced with an academic exercise concerning the necessity for a dwellinghouse if the land is in fact producing in the manner envisaged by the zoning,” said Judge Treadwell. The United Council’s appeal was refused by the tribunal, who thought that * the provision as it stood would be an aid rather than impediment to a prospective part-time farmer. The number of units which would be affected by the United Council’s proposed restriction would be small in number and insignificant in regional planning terms.