Noted Darwin architect and developer Hans Vos has died after a long illness.

He was 70.

Mr Vos was a leading light in the conception and design of the waterfront suburb of Cullen Bay, on a harbourside fringe of the CBD.

He was also one of the proponents of a plan to develop a suburb called Arafura Harbour, which included some of the East Point Reserve.

The proposed development would have stretched along the foreshore from Fannie Bay to Nightcliff, and included about 1,000 homes, marinas and a hotel complex.

It was to be built mostly on reclaimed land behind a three-kilometre sea wall.

The plan was rejected by the then Labor chief minister Paul Henderson in 2009.

Chief Minister Terry Mills says he will be asking the Northern Territory parliament to pass a condolence motion to register the contribution that Mr Vos has made to the Top End.

Mr Mills says he brought visionary ideas to the Territory.

"His legacy, memory, is reinforced by what we see around us," he said.

"That's one of the wonderful things about the craft of being an architect and a designer, and a visionary, that you'll see evidence of his work all around us."

Former CLP deputy chief minister Barry Coulter says he thinks the controversial Arafura Harbour project will be developed one day.

He says Mr Vos left behind a document with his vision for the future of the city.

"It is a very detailed document and I think that it will be well read now by a lot of people," he said.

"That's the Vos bible, if you like, of what Darwin should look like in the next 20 or 30 years."