In this section

A district plan is a 10-year ‘rule book’ that sets out what activities we are allowed to do on land (permitted activities) and what activities we or our neighbours need a resource consent for. It impacts almost everything we do in our district, and how we do it.

In addition to regulating what we can or can’t do on a property, the district plan also controls the negative effects our activities could have on neighbours, and vice versa. For example, the district plan can decide how much noise we can make, or how close we can build a house next to the property boundary. The district plan also protects the uniqueness of our district, for example, by looking after our cultural and historic heritage, and natural environment and biodiversity.

Our current Selwyn District Plan was made fully operative on 3 May 2016. You can find the Operative Selwyn District Plan* online.

Decisions on the Proposed District Plan were publicly notified on 19 August 2023. Read the Partially Operative District Plan (Decisions Version) online.*

People who submitted on the Proposed District Plan can appeal the decisions to the Environment Court. Appeals can be made until 5pm, 6 October 2023.

Council will upload appeal process documents to the Appeals webpage, as they become available.

The provisions of the Partially Operative District Plan (Decisions Version) have legal effect. This means all resource consent applications Council receives are being assessed under the relevant provisions in the Partially Operative District Plan (Decisions Version), as well as the relevant provisions of the Operative District Plan. Once appeals are lodged and their scope and intent is fully understood, Council will work on updating the Decisions Version. This will help make it clear which provisions are still subject to an appeal.

The Partially Operative District Plan (Decisions Version) will be updated as provisions become operative.

Parts of the Proposed District Plan modified by the Council’s Intensification Planning Instrument to incorporate medium density residential standards (Variation 1) are operative from 28 August 2023. There is no right of appeal to the Environment Court on Variation 1.

*Important note: If the ePlan is not loading or displaying correctly on your device, check that you are using one of these compatible browsers: Google Chrome, Edge, Safari or Firefox.*