PC120 amendments scale back Auckland’s housing intensification plans

Auckland Council’s Plan Change 120 (PC120) — Housing Intensification and Resilience — and a package of proposed amendments to it have opened for public consultation.

Property Council will be hosting a members’ workshop on Friday 4 September to unpack the announcement in more detail and discuss advocacy positioning. If you haven’t yet received an invitation, please get in touch.

Housing capacity: a lower bar than first notified

When PC120 was first notified in November 2025, Council was required to enable housing capacity equivalent to the ~2 million homes that would have been enabled had Plan Change 78 (PC78) become operative, including the Medium Density Residential Standards (MDRS). Since then, further amendments to the Resource Management Act reduced the minimum housing capacity requirement to 1.4 million homes. Council’s proposed amendments respond to this reduced target, with the amended PC120 package now expected to enable housing capacity in the order of 1.5–1.7 million homes.

It’s worth remembering that “housing capacity” is a measure of what the planning rules would theoretically enable if every site were redeveloped to its maximum potential. It is not a build forecast. Actual delivery will continue to depend on infrastructure capacity, commercial feasibility and market demand.

Walkable catchments

The overall walkable catchment methodology is largely unchanged from what was notified in November 2025:

• 800 metres (10-minute walk) around metropolitan centres and existing/planned rapid transit stops.
• 1,200 metres (15-minute walk) around the edge of the City Centre zone.

Notably, several stations that were “planned” in November 2025 have since opened, including Drury and Paerātā train stations (walkable catchments limited to areas with “live” urban zoning), while the Maungawhau (Mount Eden) Train Station catchment has been reduced by around 20ha in its western and southern areas.

Building heights in walkable catchments

• The five walkable catchments where the Resource Management Act requires legislated heights are retained: 15 storeys (50m) at Maungawhau, Kingsland and Morningside; 10 storeys (34.5m) at Baldwin Avenue and Mt Albert.
• A number of other walkable catchments within roughly 10 kilometres of the city centre also retain proposed 10- or 15-storey heights — with the notable exception of Meadowbank Station, which is now proposed to reduce to 6 storeys.
• Walkable catchments beyond 10 kilometres of the city centre are proposed to be limited to 6 storeys (22m) — the minimum height required under the National Policy Statement on Urban Development (NPS-UD). This affects catchments including Manukau, Albany, Henderson, Puhinui, Papatoetoe, Ōtāhuhu, Westgate and several others, which have had proposed additional height (10 or 15 storeys) removed.

Town and local centres, and frequent bus routes

• Additional apartment and terraced housing choice is retained around most town centres (e.g. St Lukes, Northcote, Onehunga), consistent with government mandates for these locations.
• Additional housing choice around local centres (smaller shopping areas such as Blockhouse Bay or Grey Lynn) has been removed, with existing Auckland Unitary Plan rules retained instead.
• Additional intensification along frequent transit corridors (major bus routes) within 10km of the city centre is retained, but is removed for corridors beyond 10km.

Wider urban area: broad withdrawal

In August 2026, Council withdrew PC120 rezoning proposals across large parts of Auckland, outside of areas where central government has mandated intensification. As a result, the vast majority of Auckland’s wider urban area reverts to the existing Auckland Unitary Plan rules (as adopted in 2016).

Importantly, this withdrawal applies to mapping/zoning changes only. Proposed changes to zone provisions (rules and standards) for the Mixed Housing Urban (MHU), Mixed Housing Suburban (MHS) and Single House (SH) zones generally continue to apply, even where a property sits in a withdrawn (“whiteout”) mapping area and retains its existing Auckland Unitary Plan zoning.

Key provision changes members should be aware of:

• All standards are proposed to apply once a site has 4 or more dwellings (rather than 3), giving a permitted pathway for smaller developments while requiring resource consent for higher-density schemes that don’t meet standards.
• New or amended standards are proposed across the MHU, MHS and SH zones covering landscaped areas (natural grass/plants/trees), outlook, communal outdoor living for 20+ dwellings, street-facing glazing, deep soil and canopy tree requirements, safety/privacy buffers to accessways, residential waste management, and a new combined wastewater network control (applying only in limited mapped locations).
• For the MHU zone, a key August 2026 change is the restoration of the alternative height-in-relation-to-boundary standard as a restricted discretionary consenting pathway (aligning with the current Auckland Unitary Plan), continuing to enable 3 storeys on typical sites via consent.
• Base building heights are otherwise unchanged: MHU up to 3 storeys (11m/12m with roof form); MHS up to 2 storeys (8m/9m); SH up to 2 storeys (8m/9m).

Natural hazards

Natural hazards provisions remain conceptually unchanged, but the August 2026 amendments place greater emphasis on flood hazard constraints when determining residential zoning, meaning more properties are now proposed to be downzoned.

Specifically:

• Updated flood hazard mapping now draws on both the 1% Annual Exceedance Probability (AEP) High and Very High flood hazard and the 5% AEP Very High flood hazard, incorporating updated rainfall data.
• Higher-intensity zoning continues to be applied where flood constraints are less significant; lower-intensity zoning (generally Single House Zone) is applied where flood hazards affect a greater proportion of a site.
• Natural hazard rules and related rezoning that were part of PC120 as originally notified took immediate legal effect from 3 November 2025 for the properties concerned — shown with bold diagonal stripes in the PC120 map viewer. Properties not shown with stripes do not have immediate legal effect; proposed rules apply only once decisions are made on PC120.

Special character areas

The overall approach to special character areas is unchanged, with two exceptions:

• Because the Maungawhau (Mount Eden) walkable catchment has reduced, some special character residential areas that previously fell inside that catchment (subject to a higher 75% threshold) now fall outside it and qualify under the lower 66% threshold — meaning some areas previously proposed for removal are now proposed to be retained.
• Properties losing special character protection may also have proposed zoning changes that differ from what was notified in November 2025, depending on surrounding zoning patterns, proximity to centres, main roads and amenities.

Business special character areas (Balmoral, Devonport, Eden Valley, Grey Lynn, Helensville, Howick, Kingsland, Lower Hinemoa Street, Mount Eden Village, Onehunga, Ōtāhuhu, Parnell, Ponsonby Road, Sandringham, West Lynn, Upper Symonds Street) remain identified, though the extent of most is proposed to be reduced from the current Auckland Unitary Plan.

Cohesive zoning response and precincts

• The “cohesive zoning response” — used to smooth out irregular zoning outcomes created by overlapping upzoning and qualifying-matter downzoning — continues to apply, though the areas it covers have shrunk in line with the broader partial withdrawal.
• A significant number of precincts have been withdrawn from PC120 entirely (though they remain part of the operative Auckland Unitary Plan), including Epsom, Wairaka, Flat Bush, Pine Harbour, Pukekohe Hill, Takanini, Drury 2, Albany 9, Devonport Peninsula, Kumeū, Long Bay, the three Ōrewa precincts, and numerous former Special Housing Areas.
• Amendments are proposed to two precincts that remain live: I610 Redhills and I615 Westgate.

What this means for members

Taken together, the August 2026 amendments represent a material scaling-back of the intensification originally notified in PC120, concentrated instead on the areas where central government has mandated it — the city centre, metropolitan centres, and walkable catchments around rapid transit, particularly within 10km of the city centre. Outside these areas, most of Auckland reverts to existing 2016 Auckland Unitary Plan zoning, while flood hazard constraints are being applied more assertively across the region.

For members with development interests in walkable catchments, town centres, or flood-prone sites, now is the time to review the PC120 dual map viewer against your landholdings and consider whether an amended or new submission is warranted before the 24 September 2026, 5pm deadline.

Have your say

• Members who lodged a submission on PC120 as notified in November 2025 should note that existing submissions remain valid through this period. You can choose to leave your submission as-is or amend it to respond to the proposed amendments.
• Submission page: Auckland’s Future Housing Plan – Have Your Say
• Detailed proposed amendments: Auckland Council – Proposed Amendments to PC120

If you want to attend our workshop or see our draft submission, please get in touch with Samantha.