[See all Notional Significance posts] The stream is now fully canalised, a tame channel running arrow-straight towards the harbour, as subtle as an engineer’s ruler. It once meandered across the broadening valley, softly folding into the estuarine flats. On its left bank, the colonial forces built Elliot’s Stockade to oversee the new road, but the […]
[See all Notional Significance posts] After my detour, I head back to the motorway’s edge. My route takes me along Mexted Terrace—a name that is engraved across Tawa’s skin, and with its twin associations of car dealerships and rugby it encompasses two dimensions of the suburban mythos. On the corner of Tremewan Street, with the […]
[See all Notional Significance posts] I set off along Taylor Terrace, and into the slow, steady heart of the suburbs. So far my path has traversed urban, edgelands and rural landscapes, with occasional tangential encounters across suburbia’s ragged edges. But here I am engulfed, flanked on both sides, striding out its loose domestic rhythms: hip, […]
[See all Notional Significance posts] Another bend; another ending. I cross into Tawa, which was a separate borough until 1989, when in the words of a former Mayor it was “just tacked on” to Wellington. Topographically, and perhaps in sentiment, it still leans more towards Porirua than to Lambton Harbour. But as the old track […]
[See all Notional Significance posts] In memory, my feet are weary as I leave the Halfway. My present tense seems strained now, an affectation of immediacy undermined by the distance between walking and writing: years since I was here in the flesh; almost as long since my words last travelled this road. But I must […]
(Guest cross-post from Giovanni Tiso over at Bat, Bean, Beam. There’s also comments worth reading there in response too) In what you might choose to view as a coincidence, the cities of Auckland and Wellington are both engaged in a fight to eradicate street begging. Not homelessness or poverty, mind you: just begging. Auckland will […]
So many surfaces in Wellington are crammed with posters trying to sell us something, so we thought it might be nice to look at some of the advertising that actually looks good. This week, our favourite piece of advertising are these posters from Wellington Zoo. These absolutely gorgeous animals (there’s a red panda in the […]
Here at the Wellingtonista we are generally in favour of the bicycle as a stylish and useful means of transportation. It’s true we don’t all cycle, but as proponents of livable urban spaces we can all appreciate that one less car trip is a good car trip. Along those lines, Cycling Wellington is a great […]
Rotary Forum has a question to ask. We have a rare opportunity: Wellington is what we make it and you can be part of shaping it. Now in its second successful year, this highly topical community forum asks; what kind of city and region do we want? How should community views be expressed in local […]
So I’ve been thinking about Bond Street for a while. I’ll credit Councillor Ian McKinnon for showing me what’s wrong with it. I happened to be speaking to him at a morning tea break after giving an oral presentation to a council sub-committee. He showed me a series of photos that had been given to […]