New Zealand Urban Housing Needs 1956-1976: An Economic Comparison of Alternatives Involving Different Proportions of Central High Density and Peripheral Low Density Dwellings

Abstract

It is a matter of history that the first settlers in New Zealand came from crowded conditions to a country where land was plentiful and living-space the right of everybody, rich and poor, townsman and country-dweller alike. It is true that in some of the first areas of settlement sections were quite small but the tradition of a house and a quarter acre section, even for the citizens of the largest cities, early became part of the New Zealand way of life, and there has been little sign of any widespread change of attitude as population has grown. When extensive construction of dwellings was undertaken by the State in 1936, the tradition was re-affirmed and the Ministry of Works publication, 'State Housing in New Zealand', published in 1949, observed that the density of State houses was approximately 4 houses per gross acre, that four-fifths of the houses were fully detached and about one fifth semi-detached. Minimum section size was 20 perches, the average size section being about 28 perches, so that the sections of semi-detached houses were not noticeably smaller than the others. From 1937 to 1949 the State erected over 33,000 of the 115,000 dwellings built during the period.