The Queenstown Lakes District Council has announced plans to help fast track development to deal with a growing housing crisis.

As part of a 10-year review of the District Plan, the council will be cutting red tape to make it easier and cheaper for development and removing the need for resource consents in some areas.

Changes include increasing building heights, creating business mixed use zones to allow for residential apartment blocks up to six storeys high, creating medium density zones and introducing a residential flat programme.

District plan manager Matthew Paetz said the revised plan would help deal with housing, traffic, infrastructure and landscape issues the district was facing as one of the highest growth areas in the country.

The proposal meant infrastructure already in place could be used and become more efficient.

It would make it easier to build residential flats, which wouldn't be required to be attached to either a house or garage, and allow a housing density of a scale of 1 residential unit per 250sq m in the medium density zone but no density limit where an environmental Homestar certification greater than six can be demonstrated.

The proposal protected what was valuable for the district but got rid of what was getting in the way of development, Paetz said.

"It's definitely innovative," he said.

Next month the council will lodge an application to the Environment Court to fast track part of the plan to have immediate effect.

That included the residential flat program, building of second homes on land of 900sq m and the mixed business zone.

Last year council processed a record number of 1026 resource consents, more than Wellington City Council had ever processed in a year.

Council planning and development manager Marc Bretherton said "I am of the mind policy development needs to happen quickly.

"We want this to happen because we have marked pressures."

Outstanding Natural Landscapes in rural areas will also be mapped and changes would be made to make it easier to build small farm buildings without consent.

"(It) will be contentious. Absolutely," Bretherton said.

While a decision could be made by the Environment Court in six weeks, it was expected six months of hearings would take place next year before a commissioner's decision in July on the rest of the plan.