Merivale properties go to Dunedin firm

Press, 9 July 1986, Page 8

Merivale properties go to Dunedin firm

Two prime Merivale properties are being sold to a Dunedin firm, which is believed to be planning a town house or motel development. The properties, the Long Cottage at the corner of Papanui Road and Rugby Street and the big house immediately behind in Rugby Street, are believed to have cost the developers about $1 million.

Mr John Cameron Lewis, the owner of Long Cottage, confirmed last evening that his property had b< bought b'

aaa jeen jougm y a Dunedin group. Mrs Mary Clifford, a trustee of the Clifford family trust which owns the Rugby Street house, said the sale was still going through.

Mr Cameron Lewis would not give the sale price. Nor could he say definitely what the land, about .4 hectare (169 perches) would be developed as. Part of the sale agreement, although not written in, was an understanding that the Long Cottage would remain on the Papanui Road site, Mr Cameron Lewis said.

He and his family had spent much time and “hundreds of thousands of dollars” renovating the

building since buying it in 1981, he said. The house has art historic buildings classification which requires three months public notice of its demolition and a photographic record. “The understanding is that the house stays where it is on the site,” Mr Cameron Lewis said. Whether the developers stuck to that understanding was outside his control, he said. He believed the developers were looking at a

number of proposals for the two properties. Both are zoned residential 2. The Rugby Street house is divided into flats. Mr Peter Beaven, the architect who designed the neighbouring Merivale village project, confirmed he was working on designs for the development but would not elaborate. The developers of the Merivale project also looked at the properties for possible Inclusion in the Merivale complex or as a separate development.