Demolition is set to begin on the former Bureta Park Motor Inn site this week to make way for the $20million Countdown supermarket development.

The former Otumoetai Licensing Trust property was sold to the Perry Foundation some years ago, before later being purchased by Countdown Supermarket operator Progressive Enterprises for $9million.

The Bureta Park Motor Inn is fenced off ready for demolition.

The redevelopment plan for Bureta.

Demolition of the hotel building at the intersection of Bureta Road and Vale Street is expected to take about a month.

The site will then be excavated and levelled out, and a base foundation prepared for a new supermarket, which will also take about a month, says a Progressive Enterprises spokesperson.

'Once the site is ready, we will begin the general construction. Part of this will involve undergrounding the existing overhead powerlines and inserting piles into the ground.”

The construction phase of the new Countdown supermarket and retail area is expected to take about eight months with completion due at the end of September 2014.

The $20 million development's history has been turbulent, right from the decision of Tauranga City Council staff to make the development non-notifiable, meaning the only people who had a say about whether or not it should proceed were immediate neighbours.

Progressive's application was declined at the TCC planning hearing, with the commissioners saying the application to build a supermarket in a residential zone, doesn't comply with the District Plan. The commissioners also ruled the traffic impact will be more than minor, threatening disruption and delays to commuters from other suburbs, which pass Bureta either on Vale Street or Ngatai Road.

Progressive appealed and obtained consent in September after going through the Environment Court mediation process.

The court's consent order reverses the Commissioner's decision, saying that instead of Progressive having to do a full and complete traffic study before building the supermarket on residential zoned land, it can now go ahead and build, and do the traffic study later – but that Progressive will have to pay for any required street works.

TCC strategic planner Rebecca Perret says the council role in the mediation process is to look at the reasons it was declined.

'You often find within the reasoning and discussion that there is context that implies that ‘working on this could have resulted in a different conclusion',” says Rebecca.

'So that's what we are guided on in our mediation, because it doesn't just have to satisfy the neighbours, it has to satisfy the council decision as well.”

Re-examining the traffic issues in mediation found they are not likely to be an issue, says Rebecca.

But the consent order has, 'some catches at the other end, just in case”. If a proper technical survey finds there are traffic issues, Progressive will pay to fix it.”

The District Plan issue was complicated by a zone change that was in the works during the hearing process.

The land at Bureta Park, while zoned residential, has a scheduled site over that, which enables commercial activity, like the tavern and restaurant.

The scheduled site enables the Bureta Motor Inn as a permitted activity.

The commercially zoned portion that connects with the shops was being extended along Bureta Rd to Vale St at the same time as the Progressive application was being considered.

'So that added another flavour to the planning discussion, as to what is the impact and how does it fit in the environment,” says Rebecca.

'That plan change was signed off and concluded during the mediation, so it had to become a factor of that as well.”

It's another piece of the puzzle that wasn't available at the time of the council hearing.

'So there was a commercial nature to it already, but it was more established through the mediation. The mediation reinforced that it already had a commercial nature to it, so some of the things they [Progressive] were trying to obtain, they had a right to do afterwards,” says Rebecca.

'I'm sure the community had a feeling that site, it was more community-based; perhaps not commercially-based, because it was a hub. People had a feeling they could go there and it had history.

'But that history was created on the basis that it enabled some type of commercial activity, and that could have been pulled down; and as of right, something similar could have been put up that actually restricted that community kind of feeling.”

Progressive Enterprises got the green light from the Environment Court in September 2013 to build the 4620m2 supermarket retail shops, liquor store and associated on-site parking.

The Mill is part of the new development expected to be completed later this year.