Indoor Community Sports Centre Review Report Released

An independent wide-ranging review into Wellington's proposed Indoor Community Sports Centre has confirmed Cobham Drive Park as the preferred site.

Sir John Anderson, who carried out the review, will present his findings to Councillors at a meeting on Monday. His report has been made public today in advance of the meeting and is available on the Indoor Community Sports Centre web page.

The review has looked in detail at the proposal to build a 12-court Indoor Community Sports Centre, comparing the proposed site at Cobham Drive Park in Kilbirnie with an alternative site on the Westpac Stadium Concourse.

Sir John will not make any public comment on the review in advance of the meeting at 1.00pm on Monday but has made the following observations:

"This review has been a thorough and rigorous process. It has taken nearly five weeks and I am certain we have resolved the issue of the best location for Wellington's Indoor Community Sports Centre.

"Four experts in traffic, quantity surveying, architecture and engineering, together with others who are specialists in property and valuation, legal matters, building control, urban design and town planning have supported the project manager and I throughout the review. This team has worked largely independently but has collaborated in many areas, including meeting five times during March and April.

"We talked with, and sought advice and input from, more than 40 people and reviewed in excess of 170 documents, culminating in the experts providing reports covering the relevant issues in their areas. The short forms of those reports are contained in the appendices of the review."

Mayor Kerry Prendergast offered the independent review after Councillor Andy Foster appealed to the Environment Court against the resource consent granted for an Indoor Community Sports Centre at Cobham Drive Park in January. Cr Foster has stated he will withdraw from the appeal before the report-back of the review and accept the review recommendations. The Council has agreed to abide by the review recommendations, meaning the decision about the location of the centre is now final.