Auckland Council’s Heritage team has started publication of an annual report called “Auckland’s Heritage Counts”. Begun in 2018, this programme involves collecting statistics and research on Auckland’s heritage places to raise awareness of the economic and social benefits they bring. It’s very colourful, with lots of easy to digest statistics,...
The Environment Court has released it’s final decision on the fate of the fire-damaged St James Church Hall. The decision allows for the total demolition of the single storey remains still standing on the Esplanade Rd frontage. The church congregration is now actively marketing the entire site, including the listed...
As detailed in a previous post, just before Christmas, Environment Court Judge Smith granted a demolition consent, subject to conditions to be set in February. Inexplicably, between Christmas and New Year, while congregation members were meeting in the church next door, a fire took hold in the 1885 hall, and...
Last week Environment Court Judge Jeff Smith upheld the appeal by developers View West to demolish the Category B listed St James Church Hall in Mt Eden. Auckland Council and Civic Trust argued strongly that the decision to decline the original consent should stand. Heritage NZ staff advocated for retention...
Civic Trust President Allan Matson was featured on Radio NZ on Wallace Chapman’s Sunday Morning programme today. See here for the link to listen to the RNZ item. Allan was also interviewed on facadism by the NZ Herald earlier on in the year – see link here:
This week Civic Trust is appearing at the Environment Court, supporting Auckland Council as a S.274 party to an appeal by developers View West. The developers are appealing against the decision in late 2017 by the Council Hearing Commissioners to decline their application to demolish the Category B listed 1885...
Saturday 17th November saw Civic Trust celebrate it’s 50th AGM at Kinder House. President Allan Matson presented a slide show to illustrate his report on the Trust’s activities in the past year. The guest speaker was Glen Hazelton, presently Director of Organisational Development at Heritage NZ. His presentation was on...
In this year’s Heritage Festival, Civic Trust supported the production of Incendiary 1901, a play reading in period costume by a Waiheke company, Grow Your Own Productions. It was presented on Sunday 30 September, in the Ellen Melville Hall, Freyberg Place, in the CBD, and also had performances on Waiheke...
Peter Macky, a past Civic Trust Board member, has been working for the past 10 years on the restoration of an 1866 railway station used by the German Kaiser. Peter spends six months of the year in Berlin, running cycle tours and supervising the restoration. See here for his intriguing...
Community groups, including Civic Trust, Stop Stealing our Harbour, and Urban Auckland are encouraging the community to make submissions on the council proposal to place concrete mooring “dolphins” and walkways off Queen’s Wharf, to cater for mega cruise ships. See here for an opinion piece by Julie Stout, from Urban...