Rāwhiti Domain - Lease and License application

ECSR have applied to Council for a lease and licence over parts of Rāwhiti Domain with the aim of developing a set of spaces for sport and recreation activities in a specific location on Rāwhiti Domain, which is funded by ECSR.

Eastern Community Sports and Recreation Incorporated (ECSR) have requested the below lease and licence over a portion of Rāwhiti Domain, that is in a central location in the domain.

Leased area plan.

• One existing court has already been re-surfaced and had lighting installed by ECSR.
• Installation of a new multi-sport surface and new fencing on the remaining three courts.
• Construction of a lightweight open-sided canopy building with additional lighting over three of the courts (north-south orientation). This canopy would create a year-round flexible multi-purpose facility, which could be played on in all weather.
• Construction of the canopy building may be staged over one court at a time as funding permits.
• There will always be at least one public court available for use at all times, except for when tournaments are taking place.
• Provision will be made for South Brighton Tennis Club to continue their use of the courts, as per their previous licence.

Public Access 

Eastern Community Sport and Recreation want to fully utilise this area for Sport and Recreation that is why they would like to upgrade it significantly from what it is currently. This will mean ECSR will provide a range of activity. Providing free public access for more than just tennis is an important outcome of this project.

Tournaments and leagues

in both the canopy and single outdoor court area (e.g. netball, tennis, touch, korfball, cricket, other) activity will occur regularly in evening time slots, and on Saturday morning time slots, with the exception being 10 weeks of Friday afternoon use during winter for the Primary Schools Cluster Programme, where ECSR bring 1200 school children to the park.  At these time all courts (three under canopy and one outside canopy) will not be available for public use for tennis.

Tennis in the uncovered outdoor court area

At all other times (daytime, weekends in afternoons, all day Sunday) ECSR are committed to public availability for tennis on at least the one uncovered outdoor court.

Tennis in the Canopy area

At all other times when Tournaments, leagues, programmes and training are not running under the covered canopy courts ECSR will provide mobile nets for two of the three tennis court marked areas. Use will be free and will be based on first in basis. (This free use is under the canopy with new nets on properly marked synthetic courts).

ECSR intend not to lock off the area under the canopy as various users and uses should help self-police the area. This will provide significant time for casual tennis users to have tennis play under the canopy.  However, should vandalism become an issue ECSR will need to consider locking the area and then schedule times for free access.

ECSR will maintain the outside canopy in an unlocked condition permanently once the canopy area has been built.

Images of open sided canopy building.

Existing court at Rāwhiti Domain that ECSR have resurfaced

• ECSR would like to take ownership of the former tennis club pavilion building at the south end of the tennis courts and be granted a ground lease accordingly.
• The inclusion of this area in the ground lease will be subject to the successful gifting of the building to ECSR.
• If the gifting of the building is not approved by Council, the building will be leased to ECSR.

A lease over the existing sand volleyball court

• ECSR would like the existing sand volleyball court included in their lease.
• The court will be upgraded, and fenced off to prevent animals fouling it.
• Provision will be made for public access when ECSR and the founding members are not using the volleyball court for tournaments.

Sand volleyball court at Rāwhiti Domain that ECSR would like to upgrade and fence

A licence over an area of ground south of the courts and pedestrian pathway for a radio-controlled car track

• This track will not be fenced.
• The track will be open to the public when it is not in use by the car club.

Development of the site previously occupied by the New Brighton Cricket Club building (now demolished)

• Temporary buildings are proposed for this site as a short term solution to the loss of clubrooms (due to fire). To enable this to happen more quickly, and avoid further delays to the ECSR lease process, these temporary buildings are to be approved under the existing New Brighton Cricket Club lease.
• This site will then eventually be included in the ECSR lease area, with the agreement of all parties, either when the Cricket Club lease reaches final expiry in 2022, or if the Cricket Club chooses to surrender their lease earlier.   This process will be undertaken separately and at a later date.
• New changing rooms and facilities are to be developed here in the long term. These will be used by ECSR or for the delivery of community programmes.

Rāwhiti Domain and Thomson Park have an existing reserve management plan, adopted by Council in 2007. The purpose of a management plan for a reserve is to recognise the values of the reserve, establish a vision for its future and set management plan objectives and policies to achieve the desired outcomes.

Any lease or licence application needs to be consistent with the Rāwhiti Domain and Thomson Park Management Plan(external link), and will be granted under the provision of the Reserves Act 1977.

If there are any objections to the lease and licence proposal and submitters indicate that they would like to speak at a hearing, then a Reserves Hearing Panel will be required. This panel will be made up of a number of elected members who are either a member of one of the local Community Boards or a Councillor.  This panel will listen to any objections and then make their recommendation to the Community Board, who will then make the final decision on the granting of the lease and licence.

Once the consultation period has closed and if a Reserves Hearing Panel is not required, then the project team will analyse the feedback and produce a staff report which will go to the Coastal-Burwood Community Board for a decision.

At this stage we are anticipating that a decision by the Coastal-Burwood Community Board will be made at their June or July 2018 meeting. If the lease and licence is approved it is expected to be in place by August 2018.

All submitters will receive written updates on the project, including details of the staff recommendations and meetings, and how to request to speak at the meeting if they wish to do so.

Consultation timeframe

• Monday 16 April 2018  - Consultation begins
• Friday 18 May 2018 - Consultation closes
• June 2018 - Submitters notified of consultation outcome
• June/July 2018 - Coastal-Burwood Community Board decision meeting (if a Reserves Hearing Panel is not required)
• August 2018 - Lease and licence with ECSR expected to be in place (subject to Community Board approval)