TAWA5 Most Missed

We loved you… and then you were gone. When will we see you again? When will we share those pre­cious moments? (etc etc.) Here are some great Wel­ling­ton things we miss:

Offbeat Originals

O, Off­beat! You gave us toasties, you gave us shakes, you gave us bur­gers. And you provided us with a quirky place to enjoy our nomz, with a soundtrack of bangin’ tunes from the past 40 years. But then you left us. Why did you for­sake us?

Cuba Street Carnival

Hope­fully one of the first things on Celia Wade-Brown’s agenda is to restore coun­cil fund­ing to help fund this cel­eb­ra­tion of Wel­ling­ton’s most col­our­ful street. 2009 gave us bands, mar­kets, food on sticks, car­ni­val rides, drum­mers and a night parade – pretty much some­thing for every­one. It was a beau­ti­ful thing to watch the streets come alive, and we want it back, NOW!

Manners Mall

They put a bus lane through our heart. It remains to be seen how the re-bus­sing of Man­ners Street will turn out, but one thing’s for sure – we miss that pub­lic space, along with the loiter­ing emos.

Pocket Parks

Remem­ber that linger­ing side-effect of eighties boom and bust – the pock­et park? Build­ings were demol­ished in a hurry, but new build­ings did­n’t always arise, some­times for years. So rather than hav­ing a tooth­less gap a little park would be built, little mini-oases of green­ery and seat­ing on the Golden Mile. Over time, prop­erty developers and the gum­mint have had their wicked way with most of them (e.g., the corner of Grey Street & Lamb­ton Quay; the corner of Wil­lis Street & Mer­cer Street etc). Let’s have these back again! We can even help out by sug­gest­ing a few build­ings to make way…

An Actual Waterfront Brewery Bar

You know, rather than, as one read­er put it, a “bar [that] is just a front for beer brewed by Can­tab­ri­ans or Auck­landers”. In a per­fect world, not only would we not think of a stu­pid Aus­sie bank whenev­er any­one said “in a per­fect world”, but Tuatara would come forth from their hide­away up the coast and install them­selves tri­umphantly in a water­front brew­ery bar as the hop-handed sons of Wel­ling­ton they truly are. And we would sit out front and sip their APA until the sun went down behind Te Ahu­mair­angi…