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From issue: Spring 2002

Road Block: driving straight through history

by Jane Phare

With more than two million New Zealand motorists wanting to go faster and in straighter lines, historic sites inevitably find themselves barring the way of progress.

Living on borrowed time - Bodega cafe and bar in Te Aro, Wellington Picture: Grant Sheehan

To stand in Tonks Ave, off the top of Wellington's colourful Cuba St, is to be in a decrepit time warp.
Everywhere are signs of neglect in what once was a proud little lane of Victorian workers' cottages butted against the homes of employers and landlords - various members of the founding Wellington family the Tonks.

Over the years, the Tonks Ave buildings, some dating back to the 1850s, have been stripped of anything worth stealing.

The original home at 270 Cuba Street Picture: Grant Sheehan

Yet a short walk down the block are the trappings of sophisticated city life in the year 2002 - smart cafes, office buildings, loud music, shops selling imported goods.

Tonks Ave and the neighbouring buildings have been left waiting for more than 30 years, waiting to see if a proposed inner-city bypass will in fact be built. The time warp was created decades ago when the former Ministry of Works began buying properties in Wellington's Te Aro in readiness for a bypass first proposed in 1966.

View of Tonks Avenue (and below) Picture: Grant Sheehan

Ironically, it is the delay in building the bypass that has suspended this collection of original Victorian houses and buildings in time. Without the bypass plan, they would be long gone.

The Crown now owns more than 40 properties, 23 of which are heritage buildings near, or in the way of, the bypass. Five of those are registered as Category I or II historic places. Some are listed on the Wellington City Council district plan.

View of Tonks Avenue Picture: Grant Sheehan

It has taken years of planning, negotiations, historical research and court applications to reach this point. Now the deal is that five of the 23 buildings will remain in place, 16 will be relocated and restored, one will be taken down and reconstructed and one will be demolished. Transit New Zealand, which inherited the project and the properties in 1989, will sell the rest of the non-heritage buildings for relocation or demolition.

The heritage buildings will be moved or rebuilt at Transit's expense, a project estimated to cost $3 million. Those connected with the Tonks family will be relocated near the new road flanking Cuba St, which will be known as New Tonks Ave. Another group of heritage buildings is planned in the Willis St/Abel Smith St area.

The top of Cuba Street with a message from anti-bypass campaigners. Picture: Grant Sheehan

The new bypass is just 700 metres long, is estimated to cost $25 million and will take two years to build. Transit claims the new road will free bottlenecks caused by traffic passing through Te Aro and speed travel between the Terrace Tunnel and the Basin reserve. The project incorporates walkways, cycle ways and pedestrian crossings.

Now two last-minute appeals lodged with the Environment Court have put the project on hold. The Te Aro Heritage Trust and the Campaign for a Better City have appealed the archaeological consent granted by the Historic Places Trust. The groups claim the Trust failed to protect Wellington's "unique Victorian enclaves" by supporting a Disneyland-style heritage precinct.

In response, the Trust says the relocation of heritage buildings in the way of the bypass is not its preferred option. Ideally it would like to see Tonks Ave and the other heritage buildings in the area restored on their original sites. But that is not going to happen.

The Trust's chief executive, Bill Tramposch, says granting the archaeological authority was not an easy decision. "The Trust needed to promote the best available heritage outcome under the circumstances and one that would greatly raise public awareness of the area's heritage," Tramposch says.
"We are about keeping heritage places alive and useful."

By granting the authority tagged with a list of stringent conditions, there is a two-fold win, he says. Transit will move and restore buildings that might otherwise decay and be demolished. And the archaeological dig will reveal more of Wellington's history and anything found will be given to local museums. Transit is also obliged to hold open days so that members of the public can view the excavations and what has been found before the digs are sealed over for good.

Tramposch is encouraged by a new "memorandum of understanding" being developed between the Trust and Transit. "It will allow us to work together early on in the piece on any issues in the future."

Wellingtonians themselves are divided on the bypass issue. Opponents argue that it will divide a unique community and that the new heritage precinct will be nothing more than row of Disneyland houses. They accuse Transit of being a neglectful landlord, of allowing the houses to deteriorate.

Not far away in Willis St is the Bodega cafe and bar, another Te Aro landmark affected by the bypass. The street-front cafe used to be a Victorian butcher's shop and it will be relocated. But it's a recent addition that locals will miss. Tacked on the back is a lean-to built to house a bar for Te Aro residents and a place for young musical talent to be heard. For the past 11 years the Bodega, with its basic dŽcor and red lighting, has hosted singers and bands including Bic Runga, Chris Knox, the Datsuns, who clinched a contract with Richard Branson's label V2, and scores more.

On this wintry night, Andrew Cumming is on the door, nodding at locals wanting a drink to go straight past and taking $5 from people who want to hear tonight's act, Wellington band the Spines.

Cumming has lived in the upstairs flat for four years, walked to work in the city and worked nights as a doorman at the Bodega. He, like many Te Aro tenants, will need to find somewhere else to live. And the locals, who he says use the Bodega bar as their lounge to escape tiny bedsits, will need to find somewhere else to gather.

The taxi driver who negotiates his way through Te Aro during a congested rush hour can't wait for the bypass to be completed. He says he's sick of passengers complaining about the meter ticking over when traffic stops.

Gary Tonks, a descendant of the original founding Tonks family, is resigned to the bypass. He's happy that a good slice of his family's history is to be preserved in New Tonks Ave. And he's particularly pleased that a derelict wooden house at 270 Cuba St, by the entrance to Tonks Ave, is to be saved and relocated.

The cottage, which is nearly 150 years old, was the first home of William and Jane Tonks - his great great grandparents who arrived in Wellington in 1842. The Tonks family built a brickworks nearby, undertook the city's first major harbour reclamation, built sea walls, supplied material for major building projects and established a shipping service.
Gary Tonks has heard the criticism about creating a Disneyland-style heritage village but he's more concerned to save the cottages whatever it takes. "I've got some old bricks with the Tonks name on them. I plan to give them to Transit to edge the footpaths and I'm happy to help the new owners of the houses with any information they want."

We bump into Heidi Brook, communications adviser for Transit's Wellington office, escorting a group of Southland Girls High School students on a tour of Tonks Ave and the area that will be affected by the bypass.

Neither Brook nor the students were born when the Ministry of Works first began buying these properties. But this neglected, almost forgotten corner of town has captured the imaginations of the young. Every Sunday afternoon, anti-bypass volunteers take guided tours of the area.

Surprisingly, Alexander Wright, who is opposed to the bypass, has been invited along on Brook's tour to give the opposing view. Wright rents one of the Transit-owned properties in the way of the bypass.

He argues that the bypass is an outdated plan, an anachronism from the 60s, the heyday of cheap petrol and V8 cars. He points to the high pedestrian count, the Victoria and Massey University campuses and Te Aro residents who value the area as it is as reasons for leaving the area untouched. He sees potential for a historic arts and tourism precinct.

Wright says organisations such as the Historic Places Trust are under-resourced and have limited powers.
"I'd like to think we could create a ground swell so that these organisations are properly resourced and can make a difference. There's an opportunity for all stakeholders to pull together".

Jane Phare is the Editor of Heritage New Zealand.