What Ridgeburn would do

A proposal for 1,200 dwellings at Arrow Junction has been advanced under the fast-track pathway. [Source to be added] That single number is the whole argument, because every other figure on this page is derived from it.

Ridgeburn Press is not neutral about this proposal. It is disciplined about the evidence for it. Everything below is a figure from the record, an estimate labelled as an estimate, or a question we say plainly has not been answered.

The four figures

• 1,200 dwellings. The proposed yield at Arrow Junction, delivered as one project rather than over a generation. [Source to be added]
• ~3,000 daily vehicle movements. An estimate of the traffic 1,200 dwellings would generate, landing on State Highway 6, Gibbston Valley Road and the Crown Range Road. Modelled, not measured. [Source to be added]
• ~1,000,000 litres of wastewater a day. An estimate of the daily volume the development would produce. All of it has to go somewhere, and the record has to say where. [Source to be added]
• 2.8 tonnes of nitrogen a year. An estimate of the annual nitrogen load. Phosphorus is also expected and is not quantified in any material we hold. [Source to be added]

Two further effects cannot be reduced to a number. The night sky over Arrow Junction carries a significant light-pollution risk, and no completed assessment is in front of us: Unverified — under investigation. And the change is not temporary — whatever is built here is built once.

Read the detail

Each figure has its own page, with the workings, the sources and the open questions set out in full.

• Traffic & Transport — where ~3,000 movements a day would land, on which roads, and at what hours they concentrate.
• Water, Wastewater & Nitrogen — the heart of the case: where every litre would go, and what the nitrogen does when it gets there.
• Dark Skies — why thousands of individually compliant fittings are not the same thing as a compliant night sky.
• Environment & Landscape — what is at risk, and what has not yet been assessed.

Two more pages explain the method rather than the harm: how we classify evidence, and the evidence library, where each proposition is set out with what is claimed, what is shown, and what remains open.

The visualisations, and why they are not here yet

This site is planned to carry a day-and-night simulation of the developed site, and an interactive visualisation following wastewater from household to receiving environment. Neither is built, and neither is shown here as a button that does nothing. We are publishing the assumptions those visualisations will have to disclose before the pictures exist, because a simulation is only ever as good as the numbers underneath it, and a reader is entitled to check the numbers first.

What a day and night simulation must disclose

• The occupancy rate assumed per dwelling, and how a resident population is derived from 1,200 dwellings — [Awaiting client evidence]
• The lighting specification assumed for streets, dwellings and any commercial areas: fitting type, colour temperature, shielding, and any curfew — [Awaiting client evidence]
• The atmospheric conditions modelled, since sky glow varies with cloud, humidity and aerosol — [Awaiting client evidence]
• The viewpoints used, and the hour of night each frame represents — [Awaiting client evidence]

What a wastewater visualisation must disclose

• The per-capita wastewater generation rate, and how ~1,000,000 litres a day follows from it and from the occupancy rate above — [Awaiting client evidence]
• The trips-per-dwelling assumption, which the traffic and servicing estimates share — [Awaiting client evidence]
• The nitrogen concentration assumed in treated effluent, and the treatment standard that concentration assumes — [Awaiting client evidence]
• The soil infiltration and drainage characteristics assumed at the Morven Hill disposal area, on which the whole land-application step depends — [Awaiting client evidence]
• The receiving environment the model routes water to, and the limits applied to it — [Awaiting client evidence]

When those assumptions are published with sources attached, the visualisations can be built on them and checked against them. Until then this page carries the numbers and the open questions instead of a picture.

What this page does not claim

• It makes no statement about the intentions of any company or any person. Ridgeburn Limited, Morven Ferry Limited and Queenstown Lakes District Council appear on this site only as they appear in the public record.
• It does not treat an estimate as a measurement. Every modelled figure is labelled as one.
• It does not treat silence as evidence. Where a document has not been obtained, the gap is printed rather than filled.

Evidence statement

Classification: Analysis, built on applicant figures

Status: Modelled estimates. Not independently verified; source links to be attached.

Author: Ridgeburn Press · Evidence Desk

Last reviewed: 16 September 2026

Ridgeburn Limited, Queenstown Lakes District Council and any person named here may respond in full, and the response is published unedited. How to respond.