Why haven’t the train suburbs taken off – until now?

It’s long been a feature of international cities that buyers and renters want homes within easy walk of public train lines.

Indeed, in transit-dominated cities like New York, anything more than 20 minutes’ walk from a train or subway stop is considered a ‘transit desert’.

Finally that thinking has reached Auckland. While only 4 percent of household trips are by public transport, another 13 percent by walking or cycling, the biggest growth nodes in the city are planned for people who want to ditch the car – at least some of the time.

But house prices haven't caught up with the desirability of the fast and cheap commute that trains bring. According to the latest OneRoof median value data, train-side suburbs like Panmure and Avondale are still a relatively affordable $800,000, while further out values drop to $715,000 in Glen Eden or, in the south, $635,000 for Otahuhu. That will change as the speedy journey time brought about by the City Rail Link in 2024, along with new developments springing up around stations.

And suburbs on the North Shore, with only the bus way and stations with congested car parks, may lose their price premium. Browns Bay, with a median value of $995,000, may lose its $40,000 over Birkenhead with its faster commuter links to the city.

Peter Evans, Colliers head of residential project marketing, points to regeneration around South Auckland such as the combined upgrade of the MIT campus with the new bus and train station are powerful indicators of the grown potential in the area and that are transformational for residents.

He said that home buyers make the calculation of the savings in cost and time of living near a rail or bus that can quickly, cheaply and frequently get them into work, instead of spending huge sums on car and city parking, and add those savings to what they’re able to pay for a new home.

While larger or multi-generational households might prefer cars, and tradies will be driving their vans, Evans says that young professionals want to live around the train stations.

Then there are questions of what and where the airport rail link may be.

“It will be interesting to see how that plays out , or whether they go with the old rail link through Onehunga,” Evans says. “There are enough infill opportunities [around rail] rather than greenfields developments further out where there is a lack of train.”

While right now Auckland City development agency Panuku has not turned attention to existing older town centres around the rail spine such as Otahuhu or Papatoetoe, that is also possible in a 10 year or longer timeframe, Evans thinks.

Katje Lietz, who heads urban development planning for Kainga Ora, the newly established government agency for Housing New Zealand, KiwiBuild and the former Urban Development Group, says that people don’t realise what a game changer the completion of Auckland’s City Rail Link will be when it opens in 2024.

It will slice 17 minutes of travel time from Henderson to the city, nine minutes from Papakura or Glen Innes. Onehunga will be only 31 minutes from the city, Swanson 40 minutes. Trips from Pukekohe or Papakura could be around an hour.

“If you buy a house in a town only half an hour away by train, that is super-cool – we just haven’t woken up to it,” she says. “The old railway suburbs will be super-cool places to live, especially for young professionals.

“They already have good bones – a main street with nice aspects, good views, good sun. Think Avondale, then Otahuru, Papatoetoe. Buildings around New Lynn should show us what’s possible then in Glen Eden.”

What will come, Lietz says, is what’s known as “the missing middle” in urban design terms: a town centre with medium high buildings, not tower blocks and not spread out single-family homes.

“Trains bring places closer to town,” she says, and people will wake up to the fact that it’s the time to get to town, by fast train, that matters more than geographic proximity to the city.

Tom Rawson, whose Ray White agencies cover Manukau, Mangere and Manurewa says that being on the main rail line is critical now, and he is seeing more and more growth around each station.

The only place he says being on a train line is less important is around Manukau City itself, as that is more about commercial space and the industrial hinterland that spreads around it through Wiri to the Airport. Built in the 1970s, it was based around the roads and motorway, not rail.

This resurgence is not just for distance suburbs.

Even in the city, Bayleys agent David Rainbow expects the next big surge of city fringe growth to be around Newmarket. Already, he says, the quiet, frequent electric trains have pushed up the prices around Broadway Park off the Newmarket end of Remuera Road. Rainbow predicts the new, upscale Westfield 277 mall will push another surge.

“It’s all about the transport,” he says. “Despite all the road works now, it’s fast and now it’s desirable. That’s what I’d recommend to anyone.”

Anne Duncan, has been selling real estate since the early 1990s around Mount Albert, New Windsor and beyond, calls the next growth places around the isthmus will be those around rail. She’s seen it already with Mt Albert homes within walking distance of the trains.

"Anywhere on train lines, it's the future. For ten years I've had young buyers coming back from London, and they're all used to jumping on the trains, they could see that would come [to Auckland].

“Avondale and New Windsor are next, with the motorway sorted and because it's so close to the train line."

Regeneration of New Lynn around the train station brought apartment blocks, new shopping and eating precincts. Photo / file

Barfoot & Thompson agent Ying Li Howe has already seen demand in her western suburbs territory. While schools and the house itself are number one and two on most house hunters’ lists, she’s seen proximity to transport – particularly train lines, but also bus routes – climb to number three in importance.

But that’s not all buyers, she says.

“A family pushed out of the city with sacrifice fancy outdoor space to get closer to trains,” she says. “But if they’ve already been out in say Waitakeres, or Titirangi, they still want privacy and are not putting the train line first.”

The commuter-friendly buyers are those in the 30s and 40s, she sees, while older buyers have grown up driving everywhere and still value their privacy.

“You have to explain that a modern home, you have to sacrifice the idea of a place for the kids’ trampoline to be close. Yes, you can get a brand new house with outside space, but you’d be in Helensville.”

After seeing the transformation around New Lynn around its revived train station, Howe’s buyers are now seeing the potential in the next station town out, Glen Eden. She sees trendy young professionals now walking from the train station, and says that restaurants and other amenities will quickly follow.

“You can see the physical change, it’s a transitional period – the trendy restaurants and still leftovers of the old.”

And Howe takes real pride in helping that transformation happen.

“I feel very proud to see that I moved a whole new generation of starter homes here. I see them pushing the buggy and I feel I contributed to a more trendy generation into Glen Eden.”

And what about the North Shore, the region that long neglected public transport when the Harbour Bridge went in in 1959?

“It’s a nightmare on the Shore, the roads are completely blocked and you’re sitting in traffic,” says Barfoot & Thompson agent Nadja Court.

But while being close to a busway station is desirable for home buyers, she says that the park and ride facilities, not to mention the main roads to reach the stations are so clogged that it is not helpful for commuters.

Tellingly, Court says that demand is highest around the only two stations where houses are close enough to walk to the bus – Akoranga in Northcote, and Smales Farm in Takapuna. Prices have nudged up more there, particularly around the $1million to $1.5 million mark, because there is more competition for the supply of houses.

She says people love the idea of ferry terminals up the East Coast Bays, particularly in suburbs where there used to be jetties in the pre-bridge days, but doubts the idea would get past the objections of the owners of waterfront properties who are “not happy to have in their own back yard.”

Court says that many of her clients, so frustrated at the Shore’s appalling traffic have moved across the bridge to Herne Bay, Grey Lynn and Westmere, close enough to the Shore but away from the traffic.

“A trip into the city used to take 15 minutes, but now you have to allow an hour.”