Garage building appeal fails

Press, 15 May 1985, Page 9

Garage building appeal fails

An extension to the Sydenham Service Station in Colombo Street, built last year, may have to be demolished. The 28 sq m extension to house a toilet, office, and storage space was begun in March, 1984. Building was stopped when a neighbour of the service station complained. The Christchurch City Council refused to allow the building to continue and the Planning Tribunal has now refused an appeal by the station’s owners to authorise the building. Officers in the City Council’s town-planning division said yesterday that they had not received a copy of the tribunal’s decision and could not comment. Asked if the building

would have to come down, they said a decision would be made when the tribunal’s ruling was received. One of the station’s owners, Mr John Gibson, said he had not received a copy of the decision and would not comment until he had. A building permit was issued last year for a new building for the service station, at 330 Colombo Street. The site of the new building, however, was on an adjacent Hutcheson Street address, a separate title from the station site, the tribunal decision said. Although there were existing use rights fdr the service station site they did not apply to the Hutcheson

Street site. The building permit had been issued without a change in zoning or a specified departure, apparently because council officers believed buildings on the Hutcheson Street site had existing use rights that could be transferred to any new building on that site, the decision said. The application also covered a roof over a caged storage area and the use of the Hutcheson Street site for storage of hire trailers and unloading station goods. Two buildings on the site would be demolished, the decision said. The main objector to the application was a neighbour, Mr Lamont. The garage owners had

argued that the appeal site had been used by the service station for many years. The council had acquiesced in that use and had led the station owners to believe the site had use rights, the decision said. Counsel for Mr Lamont said the commercial uses of the appeal site detracted from his house section.

The tribunal panel of three visited the service station, after the hearing in March, and decided that the City Council was correct in refusing the application, the decision said. Reasons cited were that the Hutcheson Street site had no existing use rights connected with the service station; the tribunal did not accept that the council had

misled anyone about use rights on the site; it did not believe any hardship had been done to the station by refusing the application; the site was zoned for city residential uses only; and it believed Mr Lamont had suffered some loss to the residential amenities of the neighbourhood by using the site for service station purposes.

The most important aspect was to uphold the zoning on the appeal site, the tribunal said.

It made no mention of what was to happen to the service station extension, but reserved the matter of costs, pending submissions by counsel for the station and the council.