Talk about stupid = talk about Council decisions.

I’ve just read over on the mighty Wellington Scoop that WCC has voted to raise the height on areas north of Courtenay Place, in order to satisfy some developer’s fantasy to build more than they are allowed to. This is wrong on so many levels.

For a start, the developer has been pushing the boundaries for so long that they are starting to rival Donal Rump in his ability to lie and to bullshit. I quote here from Felicity Wong’s article on Scoop:

Politicians are ready to change the rules, by regulation, to help a private development at 260 Wakefield Street, (the old Commonsense Organics site). Mayor Little and Deputy Mayor McNulty wrote to (Cities Tsar) Chris Bishop a month or so ago, asking him to change the height limits inside the Courtenay Place Heritage Area (CPHA). David Loveridge’s Watson Group’s high-density “Lido” project of 117 apartments could then proceed, without its effects on nearby heritage being considered.

The CPHA is zoned medium density, or 21m (7 storeys).

Mr Loveridge’s site has already successfully received several Council resource consents to build higher – first from 21m as zoned (6 storey medium density) to 24m (7-8 storeys), then to 30.5m and then to 32m (9-10 storeys). He is now seeking another consent for the site in order to go even higher – to 12 storeys (37.6m). The matter is now before an independent commissioner who will hold a hearing on 25 August. Council planners have recommended against its approval.

In a Kafka-like move, Mr Loveridge calls each of his extra 4 storeys as “level 7”. There is the usual level 7 (actually the 8th storey including ground level), plus a double-height “level 7A” (storeys 9 & 10), and another double-height “level 7B” (storeys 11 & 12).

On TVNZ1 last week Deputy Mayor Ben McNulty stood by the vacant lot saying that “the developer needs to go 7 levels to make it work”. He failed to mention that 5 storeys of the proposed 12 storey building are each named a variant of “level 7”.

I don’t know who Mr Loveridge is, or who he thinks he is, but having four floors of extra height all marketed as “Level 7” is just bullshit, plain and simple, and Loveridge should be poured back into his bottle with a firmly smacked bottom. He’s a young dude with plenty of fight in him, having appeared at events with the Mayor and other dignatories, but this is just silly. Here’s what he wants to do:

That building peeking out of the top of the existing buildings is what he is after. So, I hear some of you ask, “What is wrong with that?” Others of you, I hear even more loudly, are saying “Jesus – what the fuck is that and who in their right mind would want to live there?” and to you I say many things, very few of them printable.

Yes, I know that it is only a concept sketch and therefore not the finished thing, but it is truly as ugly as a 1990s heat pump and probably a lot less efficient. I mean, what sort of architect worth their salt would let an image as ugly as that out into the world?

Here it is with that bloody wire removed and the sky made looking like it occasionally shines in NZ. Oh, and I removed the building as well. Isn’t that nicer?

OK – so here it is with the building back. Still ugly though. So much beige in the world. Boring!

And so here it is with a better colour scheme – well, maybe not better, just different, but it is worth thinking about, no?

But the real crime here is not how stupid / boring / ugly the building is – and it certainly is ALL those things – its like a stack of cages for laboratory rats, but without any of the pedigree and they’re all smoking cigarettes to test vaccines for cancer. The real problem is letting some dickhead developer build 4 extra floors all called level 7 and blocking out sunshine on the nearby streets.

Yes, indeed, that is where I am going – why compromise the city for a piece of architecture as shit as this? Why not just say no to crap that spoils the city and contributes nothing back to it? Courtenay Place, along with Blair and Allen St, when the going is good, are magical. Not right now with all the scum on the footpath in every doorway, but in the early 2000s Blair and Allen were the bizz ! Heritage buildings, great restaurants, sunny by day and vibrant by night, but squeezing in a contender for the world’s shittiest development just because they want to crap all over the population – don’t do it Wellington, it is just not worth it.

Wellington has spent the last 3-5 years working on the height limits for the city, and now you want the Council to roll over and play meek and mild just because a local Dick wants to lord it over the city? Don’t be a Dick. Refuse this building.

Fish

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