District Plan Explanations

Active Street Frontage {A203, A211, A217}	Characteristic level of quiet
Amenity values	Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design (CPTED) {A203, A217, A221, A222, A226}
Edge effect	Enhancement
Health effects	Landscape character
Mauri	Natural landscape
Neighbourhood character	Physically dominate, physical domination
Privacy	Reasonable sunlight and day-light access
Representativeness	Resilience, biodiversity and integrity of the Green Network
Restoration	Rural character
Rural landscape	Safety
Shading	Sleeved (Sleeving) {A203, A211, A217}
Universal Design {A203, A217, A221, A222, A226}	Urban consolidation
View(s)	Visual amenity
Visual appearance	Visual character
Water body
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Active Street Frontage {A203, A211, A217}

Is a building, or groups of buildings that has the following characteristics:

• Building facades are varied and articulated to provide visual interest;
• Street level windows and numerous building entries are present;
• Arcades, porches and balconies are used;
• Generally there is a continuous building facade along the street frontage and buildings are adjacent to or close to the street edge;
• Retail and commercial uses predominate on the ground floor;
• Commercial and residential uses on the upper floors overlook the street through the location of glazing and balconies and the location of rooms containing activity like offices, and living areas in residential units.

Buildings that involve blank walls, an unbroken series of garage doors, or high fences along street frontages do not create active street frontages.

Amenity values

People can enjoy an area because it is beautiful, because it is important as a place of recreation and leisure, and because they associate it with something that is important to them personally. What makes one area more beautiful than another, or what makes an area differ in its beauty are its particular natural and physical characteristics or amenity values. For example, people enjoy the beauty of the West Coast for its wild seas, steep cliffs, bush and beautiful beaches and because of the feeling of wilderness. It differs from the gentler Manukau Coast. The sea, the cliffs, the sense of wilderness are the amenity values of that West Coast environment. The amenity values of different landscapes and different parts of the City are identified in the Policy Section.

Characteristic level of quiet

This is the level of quiet typical to that area.

Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design (CPTED) {A203, A217, A221, A222, A226}

CPTED is based on the concept that crime and fear of crime can be minimised through the effective planning and design in the built environment. There are two important components to the CPTED approach. One is to design the environment in such a way that it reduces the opportunity for crime to occur. The other is to design the environment in such a way that it enhances urban safety and, more specifically, perceptions of personal safety.

Edge effect

This is where wind, solar radiation, environmentally damaging plants and animal pests cause harmful changes to the edge of areas of vegetation, or are able to invade native vegetation areas and cause harmful changes.

Enhancement

This means to improve the state of something already existing. In relation to amenity it means to improve the pleasantness or character of a location or site. In relation to vegetation it means to improve the quality of the vegetation so it is of greater value to people, or contributes to an increase in natural landscape or ecosystem value.

Health effects

In respect of the height in relation to boundary standard, this is the loss of wellbeing as a result of inadequate or insufficient daylight and/or sunlight.

Landscape character

Any landscape is defined by the natural and physical features that make it unique and different. It is also defined by a particular but harder to define "feeling". This is landscape character. For example, the landscape character of the Waitakere Ranges is one of wilderness and the abundance of nature. The landscape character of the residential parts of the City is one of "openness" and calmness.

Mauri

Mauri can be described as the life force present in all things and all people. Mauri generates, regenerates and upholds creation, binding physical and spiritual elements of all things together. Recognition of the spiritual aspects of reality is central to a definition of sustainable management.

Natural landscape

A natural landscape is one that is dominated by natural features such as bush, streams and the coast, to a degree that the overwhelming feeling is one of "naturalness". Although such a landscape may contain buildings and structures, these are either so few in number that they do not encroach on this natural feeling, or they are designed and built in a way that they merge with the surrounding landscape and its natural values.

Neighbourhood character

Neighbourhood is that small local area, usually the small number of streets around a dwelling or workplace, that a person identifies with and knows most thoroughly of all parts of the City. People usually have a strong sense of belonging and place associated with a neighbourhood. It is the closest, most personal and intense expression of the relationship of people with their environment.

Such neighbourhoods reflect the general amenity values of the surrounding landscape or local area but have their own versions of those general features that allow inhabitants to see them as unique and special. This is the neighbourhood character that defines a neighbourhood as unique. Often the particular streetscape contributes strongly to the local neighbourhood, although it is the personal perceptions of residents that ultimately define the nature of that neighbourhood. The Policy Section identifies 'landscape', 'local area' and 'character'. Neighbourhoods within these local areas reflect the general identified characteristics of each area, but have their own particular version of these general features.

Physically dominate, physical domination

Structures, through their size or their bulk and form can dominate surrounding properties. Whether they dominate depends on the relative size of surrounding structures, whether they are screened, and, to a degree, whether the design of the building (such as roof angles and joinery) is sympathetic to the features found in surrounding buildings. Generally, physical domination is dictated by the size of the building relative to surrounding buildings. For example, a six storey building in a residential area with mainly one to two storey buildings may dominate the surrounding sites and detract from the amenity values of those sites and of the wider area.

Privacy

This is that quality usually associated with a site or place where people feel free from overlooking or being observed, or from being overheard. This sense of privacy is highly valued. The location of buildings too close to areas or residential sites where people play or relax can detract from that sense of privacy.

Reasonable sunlight and day-light access

Reasonable daylight access means that habitable rooms of residential buildings receive enough daylight at all times of the year to contribute to the general health and wellbeing of the occupants. Reasonable sunlight access means that dwellings can be conveniently located or designed to receive adequate midwinter sun, to contribute to the wellbeing of the occupants and to the use of solar energy in water and space heating of the building.

Representativeness

This is the extent to which an area represents or shows those aspects which make up the natural diversity of Waitakere City's original (pre-human) natural landscape. As Waitakere City is divided into the Waitakere and Tamaki ecological districts, then the representativeness of Natural Areas needs to be seen within the context of the particular district it falls within.

Resilience, biodiversity and integrity of the Green Network

Resilience is the ability to remain viable and to be able to recover from disturbances or interference.

The sort of aspects to be considered when looking at resilience of the Green Network will differ to some extent, depending on the element of the Green Network being considered. Examples are as follows:

Resilience of native vegetation and fauna habitat is greatest if, when clearing an area, the shape of the clearing has the lowest edge to volume ratio of the vegetation area to prevent edge effects and reduce the spread of environmentally damaging plants (i.e. clear from two existing edges instead of in the middle of vegetation). Another example is subdivision works carried out in a way that does not fragment existing vegetation or isolate patches of vegetation from other patches.

Resilience of outstanding natural features is adversely affected if activities such as earthworks speed up natural processes such as erosion and slippage. Similarly, any development of barriers that would effect natural processes should be avoided - such as placing buildings in the path of a shifting dune system.

Resilience of linkages and restoration areas is unlike the other parts of the Green Network in that these areas have no or low resilience. Therefore activities should help to promote the regeneration of vegetation and its links to other areas of vegetation, so that they will become resilient.

Resilience of coastal areas could be assisted/ continued by ensuring that coastal vegetation and dunes survive, so that natural processes, such as replenishment of sand to beaches, are able to occur.

Biodiversity means the variability among all living things. This includes diversity within species, between species and of ecosystems, and interactions between biological communities, habitats and their physical surroundings.

In the context of the Green Network biodiversity can be maintained and enhanced by preventing the loss of the number of plant and animal species, community types and the different physical sites where they occur. For example, loss of manuka on the leached or nutrient deficient soils in Waikumete Cemetery which provide habitat for fauna not found elsewhere in the City.

Integrity of the Green Network means conserving and enhancing the natural features that are of the healthiest quality and are most representative of Waitakere City. In the Green Network these natural features equate to the areas identified as being outstanding (i.e. outstanding vegetation, outstanding fauna habitat and outstanding landforms). Integrity can be maintained and enhanced in other areas that are not outstanding by preventing the interruption of natural processes (for example removal of mature trees that provide seeds for regeneration) and by following the principles outlined below when revegetating areas.

Principles of Ecological Revegetation
1. Use only 'eco-sourced' plant material, i.e. seeds and cuttings from native plants that naturally occur in the closest location to the revegetation site.
2. Plant species in the sites where they would occur naturally.
3. Plant to facilitate natural regeneration. This includes mimicking natural regeneration by planting pioneer or early successional species first (species that will encourage other plants to grow), followed by species that establish later in the regeneration process.
4. Plant to avoid or minimise weed problems and the effects of drought and wind. This includes clumping plants closely to create asheltered micro-climate and to crowd out weed species, and planting fast-growing species that out-compete weed species when establishing the initial vegetation cover.

Restoration

This means to facilitate the return of an area to its original (pre-human) state, or to a state that will bring about the natural processes necessary for the return to an original state. It may involve
active management techniques such as revegetation, pest and weed control, and re-introduction of indigenous species.

Rural character

Rural character reflects the dominance of rural features such as rolling paddocks, streams, farming, livestock and horticultural activity to a degree that the overwhelming feeling is one of open countryside, a sense of productive activity and of managed nature. Although such a landscape may contain buildings and structures these are clearly subordinate to the expansive rural features such as paddocks and shelterbelts. The buildings and structures are so few in number that they do not impinge on this natural feeling, or they are designed and built in a way that they merge with the surrounding landscape and its natural values.

Rural landscape

A rural landscape reflects the patterns of pasture, cultivated lands, trees and buildings and the rural activities that take place within them. For example, in the northern part of the City the landscape is rural, with its combination of pasture, gardens, glasshouses, buildings associated with horticulture and the distinctive shelter belts along the edges of paddocks. Shelter belts are a particularly important part of the rural landscape, with the mix of older shelter belts (usually macrocarpas or pines) associated with pastoral farming, and the lighter deciduous shelter belts associated with horticulture. With such a rural landscape, the landscape elements are made up directly from the rural activities that take place within it, while the landscape character also comes from these activities.

Safety

In relation to a person, this means free from harm, and in every other case, means free from hazards.

Shading

Casting a shadow preventing access to sunlight and daylight.

Sleeved (Sleeving) {A203, A211, A217}

Locating small buildings and activities, with their entrances orientated to the street, on the outside of a large format retail building or activity; thereby helping to create an active street frontage and
mitigating the effects of large expanses of blank, unarticulated walls.

Universal Design {A203, A217, A221, A222, A226}

Universal Design refers to the design of environments to be usable by all people, to the greatest extent possible, without the need for adaptation or specialised design. Universal Design benefits people of all ages and abilities.

Urban consolidation

Urban consolidation refers to a strategy that has been adopted in the District Plan to consolidate, where possible, population growth within the existing urban area. This strategy includes the following:

• placing limits on settlement outside the urban area and on population growth, according to the capacity of natural and physical resources, landscapes and amenity values to absorb impacts
• managing the concentration of settlement in limited areas on the edges of the urban area
• encouraging concentration of Residential Activities in designated parts of the City via medium density housing
• managing the location of Retail Activities to counter pressure for a "spread" city
• managing infill housing to protect amenity values in the urban area, while accommodating increased densities where possible.

View(s)

This is an extent of land or sea considered to have visual amenity that is covered by the human field of vision from a particular point.

Visual amenity

An area can be valued because of emotional associations that people have with it, because of a sense of wilderness or, conversely a sense of coherence and quiet. It can also be valued purely because of its beauty and attractiveness at a visual level. Visual amenity is those particular elements of a landscape or area that contribute to the appreciation of an area at a visual level.

Visual appearance

An area or object can be notable for a range of reasons - for emotional associations for example. The visual appearance, that is, how it looks purely in terms of shape, texture or colour, is also a factor in how people assess or relate to an area or object.

Visual character

Landscapes are defined in part by the landscape elements (physical and natural features) and landscape character (the "feel" of a landscape). The latter is of course influenced by the combination of landscape elements. Visual character is the particular qualities of a landscape that derive from the visual mix (shape, texture and colour) of objects that make up the landscape. For example, the Waitakere Ranges have a visual character that is dependent on the particular colours and textures of native bush and the shape of the ridgelines as they meet the sky. Residential areas have a visual quality that comes from the mix of houses and trees. There is variety but also a coherence gained from the repetition of colour and shape. This visual character is an important part of the landscape.

Water body

This is any freshwater or geothermal water in waterways (rivers and streams), lake, pond, wetland or aquifer or any part thereof, that is not located within the coastal marine area.