Over the past 30 years Tauranga's population has doubled and is expected to grow by more than 50,000 within the next three decades.

To manage future growth of the city, council will be working to understand how local communities could change over time and what people's future needs and priorities may be.

As part of this, council will be running a series of events in the city's central suburbs to inform its next stage of planning. Council has also begun investigating how specific City Plan rules may need to change to support a wider range of housing choice that guide and control the level of change that is appropriate.

Although growth will affect the wider city, recent community engagement showed support for a more compact city with higher density housing types focused around centres and public transport hubs, as well as areas of high amenity.

As a result, council have identified the area which runs from the Harbour Bridge to Barkes Corner, including the Avenues, Gate Pā, and Greerton, as having the ability accommodate growth. This area was historically known as Te Papa meaning ‘the flat area'.

Tauranga City Council General Manager for Strategy and Growth, Christine Jones says Te Papa is centrally located and already has some of the key community, social and infrastructure assets in place.

'To manage the long term growth of our city over time, the Te Papa peninsula provides an opportunity to provide more housing choice in close proximity to significant employment hubs, services, schools and parks. It is also well serviced by public transport services that will improve in frequency over time. The peninsula also has a comparatively lower risk to the natural hazards that our coastal areas face.”

The upcoming events will give interested residents the ability to input on what future growth looks like within the Te Papa peninsula.

Council will use the information it gathers at the upcoming community events together with information from key stakeholders to prepare a plan over the next 12 months, (known as a spatial framework or blueprint). This plan would focus on things like the transport, infrastructure and community facility projects required to support growth and change, which will be shared back with the community. Findings will also inform specific changes to the City Plan, that will run alongside the development of the spatial framework.

Upcoming events and updates

To find out about the upcoming community events or to sign up to E-News on the project visit council's website www.tauranga.govt.nz/Tepapa Event details will be available from 1 August.

Map showing the Te Papa peninsula.