Queenstown subdivision, ski field, conference centre and cable car - Fast Track details released
It's a big plan that could end up competing with other large scale Queenstown fast track projects
Official information documents have been released that show the full extent of an ambitious cable car, conference centre, ski field and subdivision above Queenstown's Fernhill area.
The proposal is to develop two funicular railways (‘Suburban’ and ‘Saddle’ funiculars) that connect a retail, hospitality, and conferencing precinct from down below (Powerhouse Precinct, including the Powerhouse International Convention Centre), with a proposed higher residential suburb (Fernhill Heights), along with sightseeing, recreation, and conservation activities up the Te Taumata Hakitekura Saddle and Bowen Peak (including the Bowen Peak Ski Area/mountain bike park and Ben Lomond Predator-free Sanctuary).
The project overview
The main person behind the project is Guy Hingston, a surgeon who has been based in Australia. He graduated from the University of Otago medical school 35 years ago, and he currently helps Australian rural communities with their shortage of surgeons. However, he now lives part-time in the family’s home in Fernhill.
Dr Hingston told Crux today that he was not making any detailed comment at this stage, but documents contained in the LGOIMA information request include an economic impact report that suggests the cable car/rail project would carry "at least 1.1 million passengers per year (3,000 per day)" and produce $120 million of additional tourism spend, as well as 250 extra jobs in winter - 150 in summer.
The proposed new subdivision
Arrowtown based economist Benje Patterson wrote the economic impact report to support the Fast Track application.
The proposed base station for the cable car next to the Fernhill roundabout
He concludes his report as below:
"The package of proposed developments within the Powerhouse Funicular Railways Queenstown Regional Development project are of a scale and impact which are judged to be regionally and nationally significant under the Fast-Track Approval Bill.
"All analysis in this high-level assessment of significance has been made based on assumptions regarding the scale and scope of the project package as it stands at present. Considerations related to tenure of landholdings, commercial factors (e.g. capital raising and delivery partners), and climate (including snowpack) have been out of scope of the analysis. As further design work occurs, and the project package evolves, estimates will need to be refined further. It is also worth noting that other potential projects, including other Fast-Track project applications could be received in the local area which might introduce trade-offs and have a bearing on more detailed economic significance considerations of the Powerhouse Funicular Railways Queenstown Regional Development project."
You can read the full economic development report here.
You can read the full Fast Track application here.
A new website has been launched today that details the project.
Main Image: a similar rail/cable car operation is based in the Sierra-Crans Montana area of Switzerland.
Has anyone given any thought to how you get all these people along Lake Esplanade and negotiating the One Mile roundabout? There is zero spare transport capacity today. Are they going to levitate from Frankton direct?
So what we have is a breast reduction specialist surgeon, a gentleman not backward in coming forward with practice-promotion, partnered with, it appears, his youthful son Matthew, a manager at Valquest, a project management business, proposing to tear up the valley and create general mayhem for a completely unprepared Queenstown, all dressed up in cute-sounding care for the disabled and iwi interests. It's all bollocks.