A Plan Change to protect additional heritage features in the Queenstown Lakes District Plan will be notified tomorrow (Wednesday).

"Not only does the Plan Change contain 92 new items of heritage value, including trees and various structures and buildings but it also contains a new definition of heritage landscapes so that significant heritage values are recognised and protected," QLDC planning and strategy manager Vicki Jones said.

The new items include the One Mile Powerhouse, the Lower Shotover Bridge, the stone wall at the old Arrowtown Primary School, a hut on Rafters Road in the Gibbston Valley, the A and P Showground building at Wanaka, the Cardrona Church and hall, the former Glacier Hotel at Kinloch and the Kingston Railway turntable.

There were five heritage landscapes listed in the Plan Change, they are:

• Skippers
• Moke Lake
• Glenorchy-Wynuna
• Macetown
• Seffertown

"Many of the new items on the register were identified by working parties made up of members of the public with particular interest and knowledge in the history of the district, which were set up in both Wanaka and Queenstown. These working parties identified and assessed over 150 items and this work formed the basis of the final Plan Change"," Ms Jones said.

In addition to the Plan Change, the Council has put together a Heritage Inventory, which pulls together the background information that the Council has on all the items that were considered during this process.

"The Council has also set aside some funding to encourage and in some cases assist in the ongoing protection of heritage items," Ms Jones said.

Copies of the Plan Change were available at Council and CivicCorp offices and at the Queenstown, Arrowtown, Glenorchy and Wanaka libraries. The register could also be downloaded from the Council website from tomorrow at www.qldc.govt.nz.

"We have also written to individuals with heritage items located on their property. Submissions will be open until July 22, 2005," Ms Jones said.

Once submissions had been processed, a summary of submissions would be prepared.

"The process then requires us to publicly notify the summary and any person can then lodge a further submission in support or opposition to any of the original submissions," Ms Jones said.

The next phase would involve hearing all original and further submissions.

It was important that the public realised that once a Plan Change was notified it became operative.

"In other words if the Plan Change identifies a heritage item, then that item must be considered a heritage item from tomorrow, unless otherwise decided by the hearing panel," Ms Jones said.

ENDS

For further information please contact Vicki Jones 03 441 0499.

By: Tamah