Pūtarikamotu Riccarton Bush: Looking Beyond the Trees
Pūtarikamotu Riccarton Bush, 2022.
Pūtarikamotu Riccarton Bush is one of the oldest and best documented protected natural areas in Aotearoa. As a rare remnant kahikatea floodplain forest, Pūtarikamotu has survived natural catastrophes and the impact of two human cultures and is now the only original area of native bush remaining in Ōtautahi Christchurch. This landscape once covered much of the Canterbury Plains.
When Christchurch City Council began responding to Plan Change 14, the challenge wasn't just to understand the heritage landscape values of the bush. Those values were already well recognised. The more difficult question was:
How might surrounding intensification change the experience of this nationally significant place?
My role was to undertake a comprehensive heritage landscape assessment of the area surrounding Pūtaringamotu and to evaluate how increased building heights could affect its heritage landscape values.
Using three-dimensional modelling and landscape and visual assessments, we assessed key public viewpoints and modelled potential development scenarios to understand how future change might influence the relationship between the bush and its wider setting. We also provided expert evidence for Council during the Plan Change 14 process.
Projects such as this remind us that heritage landscapes extend well beyond the boundaries shown on a map. The significance of Pūtaringamotu lies not only within the remnant forest itself, but also in the relationship between the bush and its surrounding setting. Changes to neighbouring development can gradually alter the prominence, legibility and sense of place that make a landscape distinctive.
Understanding those relationships is an important part of landscape planning. Careful assessment provides councils, planners and decision-makers a framework for balancing growth with the long-term protection of heritage landscapes, ensuring that decisions made today do not gradually erode the qualities of a place that communities value most.
Sketch of Pūtarikamotu Riccarton Bush, 1848. Source: Fox, William, 1812-1893, “Riccarton. Messrs Deans’ Station. Canterbury.,” accessed August 5, 2026, https://otago.ourheritage.ac.nz/items/show/5291.
‘Ilam Farm, Riccarton Bush’ by Frederick Aloysius Weld, Dec. 1852. Source: Canterbury Museum.
Pūtarikamotu Riccarton Bush, 2022.
Kahikatea tree roots, Pūtarikamotu Riccarton Bush, 2022.
View looking northwest towards Pūtarikamotu Riccarton Bush, with graphic overlay showing possible apartment configuration under a 12m height limit proposal within the Riccarton Bush interface. Source: Pūtarikamotu Riccarton Bush Heritage Landscape Review. Prepared by Wendy Hoddinott (WSP) for Christchurch City Council, 20 December 2022.
Keen to learn more … explore these projects!