Wellington Harbour Board

Wellington city was settled by British colonists in 1840 and quickly became an important port and business centre. Small private wharves built in the 1840s became inadequate as trade grew and visiting ships became larger. From 1856 the Chamber of Commerce began agitating for a large publicly owned wharf. Wellington Provincial Council gave permission, and Queens Wharf was built in 1862. It was managed by a wharf committee of the Provincial Council. In 1870, Wellington City Corporation (now Wellington City Council) came into being, and in 1871 the Provincial Council sold its interest in Queens Wharf to the City Council, along with the bond store at the wharf and some newly reclaimed land. == Establishment ==

The Harbour Board initially consisted of 10 members: three appointed by the Government, the mayor, one person elected by the Chamber of Commerce, two members elected by Wellington ratepayers, one representing shipping interests, one elected by Hutt County Council, and one to represent the Wairarapa County Councils. William Hutchison (Mayor of Wellington), Joseph Edward Nathan (representing the Chamber of Commerce), William Valentine Jackson and Paul Coffey (elected by ratepayers), Henry Rose (of the New Zealand Shipping Company, representing shipping interests), Stephen Lancaster (representing Hutt County Council), and Frederick Augustus Krull (a Wellington businessman representing Wairarapa, and the Consul for the German Empire). Wellington Harbour Board was unique amongst New Zealand harbour boards because as well as control and regulation of the port, supplying water to ships, and providing cool storage, it acted as wharfinger, responsible for taking goods from ships and delivering them to other ships or to destinations in the city. This was said to be cheaper and more efficient than having other businesses do the work, and gave the board strong authority. Although the Harbour Board was set up with powers to manage shipping, wharf charges and trade in the harbour, it initially had no assets. The board was entitled to take a loan from central government. In October 1881 the Harbour Board paid the City Council £64000 for Queens Wharf and the bond store, and the wharf became its centre of operations. Harbour Board employees in October 1881 consisted of the harbourmaster, outward pilot, four boatmen, pilot, coxswain, and two signalmen. Following passage of the Wellington Harbour Board and Corporation Land Act in September 1880, control of Railway Wharf was transferred to the Harbour Board. == Facilities ==

Wharves More wharves were built around the inner harbour. The first wharf built by the Harbour Board was Wool Wharf (now Waterloo Quay Wharf), completed in 1883 to handle the wool trade. This was followed by Ferry Wharf (1897), Glasgow Wharf (1901), Taranaki Street Wharf (1906), Kings Wharf (1909), Clyde Quay Wharf (1910), Tug Wharf (1914) and Pipitea Wharf (1923). In addition to the big wharves built in the inner harbour for movement of goods and passengers, the Harbour Board oversaw construction of suburban wharves in the eastern bays from Petone around to Eastbourne as well as at Evans Bay and Seatoun and Karaka Bay at the harbour entrance. Head Office and Bond Store With the business of the port expanding, the Harbour Board commissioned a new administration building and bond store to replace earlier wooden buildings. The building was built on Jervois Quay at the entrance to Queens Wharf, and was completed in 1892. As of 2025 it houses the Museum of Wellington. The Harbour Board's board room is still on site and open to the public. Wharf Office Building In 1896 the Wharf Office Building was built opposite the Head Office and Bond Store at the entrance to Queens Wharf. Art Nouveau gates made of iron were installed in 1899 between these two buildings at the wharf entrance. As of 2025 the Wharf Office Building houses apartments and the New Zealand Academy of Fine Arts. Evans Bay Patent Slip A patent slip for hauling up ships for repair was built at Evans Bay in 1873. It was operated by the Wellington Patent Slip Company and didn't come under Wellington Harbour Board control until 1908. The Patent Slip Company, which was 90% owned by the Union Steam Ship Company from 1908, continued to operate the slip (and a second slip built in 1922) under lease from the Harbour Board until 1969, when the Harbour Board took over direct management of both slips. The first slip was taken out of commission and the second one was upgraded. It closed in 1980. One of the triggers of the 1913 Great Strike was a demand by Wellington shipwrights that they be paid travelling time when they had to go to Evans Bay to work at the patent slip. Clyde Quay boat harbour In 1898 local yachtsmen complained that reclamation at Te Aro and other work around Railway Wharf was displacing moorings for small boats. The Harbour Board suggested that yachts could be moored at Evans Bay but the yachting community objected, saying it was too far away and isolated, boats would be vandalised, and the winds there were not ideal. in 1900 the Harbour Board approved construction of a boat harbour and baths at Clyde Quay. Old structures on the beach were removed, Clyde Quay and Oriental Terrace (now Oriental Parade) were widened and a sea wall built, and public salt water baths and a boat harbour for pleasure craft were created. The boatsheds were designed with their roofs below the height of the sea wall so that views of the harbour would not be obstructed. The boatsheds were completed in 1907 and, along with another group of sheds built in 1922, are still in use. Dredges, tugs and launches In 1882 the board bought a Priestman dredge so that it could remove silt and increase the depth of some berths. In 1902, that dredge was replaced with a new steam dredge. The dredge, named Whakarire ('to deepen water'), was built by Lobnitz and Co. in Renfrew, Scotland and sailed to New Zealand via the Suez Canal and Torres Strait. Whakarire was sold to Napier Harbour Board in 1934 and replaced by Kerimoana ('to dig the sea') in 1938. Kerimoana was scrapped in 1981. Various privately owned vessels acted as tugs and pilots on the harbour during the 19th and 20th centuries. For example, Wellington Harbour Ferries operated a tug called Duco between 1892 and 1909, and the Union Steam Ship Company bought a tug named Natone in 1904. In 1900 Wellington Harbour Board bought a launch it named Uta, to use as a pilot boat. Uta served the Harbour Board until 1950, and was replaced by Tiakina in 1953. In 1925 Wellington Harbour Board acquired a purpose-built deep water salvage tug, which it named Toia ('to pull'), on loan from the British Admiralty. The Board also commissioned construction of a floating crane, HIkitia ('to lift') and a new harbourmaster's launch, Arahina ('to lead'). In 1949 Toia was returned to the New Zealand Navy, to be based at Devonport Naval Base and not replaced because the Union Steam Ship Company had two tugs for use in Wellington harbour. Arahina rescued many people from the passenger ferry Wahine when it ran aground at the entrance to Wellington Harbour in 1968. Arahina was sold in 1990, but as of 2023 was still afloat and moored at Queens Wharf. As of 2023 it was in use as a private charter boat in Dunedin. When the Wahine ran aground in 1968, killing 51 people, the Union Steam Ship Company's tug Tapuhi was not strong enough to assist the ship. Responding to the disaster, the Harbour Board bought new, bigger tugs: Kupe, which went into service in 1971, Toia (1972) and Ngahue (1977). The Harbour Board's successor, CentrePort, sold Kupe in 2009, As of 2025 it is still in working order and thought to be the only working steam crane of its kind in the world. Jubilee floating dock In 1928, the Harbour Board announced a decision to procure and install a floating dock with a lifting power of 15,000 tons, to be used for ship repairs. The floating dock was built in England by Swan Hunter & Wigham Richardson of Wallsend, with the contract awarded in August 1930 for a dock with a lifting capacity of 17,000 tons, with dimensions long and wide. It left the Tyne on 15 July 1931 and was towed for five and a half months at sea over a route through the Suez Canal, covering , and arrived in Wellington Harbour on 28 December 1931. A wharf was built adjacent to the Thorndon reclamation for permanent mooring of the floating dock. The dock was powered by electricity and included a crane capable of lifting up to five tons. The dock was named 'Jubilee Dock' in honour of the Harbour Board's fiftieth anniversary in 1930. An initial test of the floating dock was undertaken with the passenger liner SS Ruahine, on 2 April 1932. The first commercial service using the new floating dock was an overhaul of the ferry TSS Maori, from early April. One of the more notable incidents associated with the floating dock during more than 50 years of service was the repair of the trans-Tasman liner MS Wanganella after it struck Barrett Reef while entering Wellington Harbour in January 1947. Shortly after entering the floating dock, repair work on the vessel was halted because of an industrial dispute. In 1988, the Harbour Board sold the floating dock to an engineering firm in Nelson, and it was then on-sold for use in Singapore. The dock was taken in tow from Wellington, but broke up and sank on 2 January 1989, only five days into the tow. == Progress ==

by year in Wellington Harbour. Reclamation Although the Harbour Board controlled the wharves, Wellington City Council retained control of the Te Aro seabed and foreshore. From 1884 to 1889 the Council conducted a programme of reclamation which brought it into conflict with the Harbour Board. 1930: New Zealand's main port 1930 marked the 50th year of operation of the Wellington Harbour Board. In 1930, Wellington was the main trans-shipping port in New Zealand, with over 3000 trading vessels visiting in the previous year. During World War 2, Wellington was an important port for troop movements. United States authorities were given sole use of the newly developed Aotea Quay. In October 1943, the 2nd Division of the United States Marine Corps embarked at Aotea Quay on their way to the Battle of Tarawa. Shipping companies refused to employ workers unless they agreed to work overtime. Workers were then locked out of the wharves, which at that time were fenced and able to have access restricted. On 15 February 1951 there were 21 foreign ships berthed in Wellington and a queue of freighters waiting to berth, and by the end of March, 38 ships were in the harbour waiting to discharge 70,000 tons of cargo. As Harbour Board employees refused to work, the government called in hundreds of army and navy servicemen to unload ships. At the end of March, Harbour Board employees voted to return to work, but other workers on the wharves remained on strike. The dispute lasted 151 days and led to changes in the unionisation and employment conditions of waterfront workers. Between 1950 and 1960 the board built bulk-handling facilities for coal and wheat at Aotea Quay and began development for a roll on/roll off-road and rail ferry at Interisland Wharf. The ferry Aramoana came into service in 1962. Development of Wellington Airport, which opened in 1959, required land, foreshore and harbour areas controlled by the Harbour Board, so in an arrangement with the Government the board ceded these areas to the airport development and received land near the Hutt River estuary in exchange. The board reclaimed of land near its Point Howard oil wharf for leasing to oil companies. Construction of the Wellington container handling terminal was underway by 1971, including a reclamation at the end of Aotea and Fryatt Quays. Two new tugs, Kupe and Toia, were purchased to handle the larger ships expected, and a 40 tonne container crane was ordered. Erection of the container crane began in early 1971. The first container ship arrived in Wellington in June 1971, but was unloaded with conventional cranes, because an industrial agreement with unions had not yet been reached for the operation of the container crane. A second container crane was ordered for the port and delivered in 1975, but an industrial dispute with the boilermakers union caused delay to the construction. A separate industrial dispute involving demarcation issues caused a 3-year delay to the commissioning of a crane intended to load containers onto railway wagons at the port. The crane was finally put into service in August 1975. In November 1976, funding was approved for a third container crane at the port. Industrial disputes involving the Wellington boilermakers and the Federation of Labour caused a delay of almost 12 months in the construction and commissioning of the crane. The delays to the construction of the container crane, along with more protracted delays to the construction of the steel structure of the BNZ building in Willis Street, led building developers to change designs and move away from the use of steel as a main structural element in building construction. In the 1979 financial year, the Harbour Board reported 85,257 container movements. == Organisational change ==

With the shift of port facilities to the Thorndon container terminal, other parts of the waterfront could be redeveloped. In 1986 the Lambton Harbour Group – a collection of architects, urban designers and town planners – was formed to develop concept plans for 22 hectares of the waterfront between Wellington Railway Station / Waterloo Quay and the Overseas Passenger Terminal (formerly Clyde Quay Wharf). Lambton Harbour Group was later renamed Lambton Harbour Management. About 80% of the area was owned by the Harbour Board. The Board and Wellington City Council would together choose which concept they preferred for the area. One of the first projects proposed by the Lambton Harbour Development Project was the Queens Wharf Retail Centre, initially described as a 'Festival Marketplace' or 'Market Hall'. The retail centre opened in 1995 but was an immediate failure and the building was sold in 1998. Other early projects included the redevelopment of Frank Kitts Park, begun in 1989, and the refurbishment of Shed 3 as Dockside restaurant, begun in 1991.Wellington Harbour Board was disestablished after the passing of the Port Companies Act 1988 and the Local Government Act 1989, as part of the 1989 local government reforms. Operational port assets were transferred to a new commercial company called Port of Wellington (now known as CentrePort) formed on 1 October 1988. Ownership of the Port of Wellington company was vested in Greater Wellington Regional Council and Horizons Regional Council. When the port company was formed, it owned approximately of Wellington waterfront property including wharves. The remainder of the Wellington waterfront area, from Shed 21 to Clyde Quay Wharf, including all the buildings and the area covered by the Lambton Harbour Development Project, was transferred to Wellington City Council. In 1988, Australia was New Zealand's biggest trading partner but most of the new Port of Wellington's business was with Europe and Japan. Meat and manufactured goods were the main products exported from Wellington, with other products shipped through the port including bulk wheat and cement, machinery, steel, imported cars, meat, dairy and wool. The Harbour Board's interest in the Lambton Harbour Development Project was transferred to Wellington City Council under the provisions of the Local Government (Wellington Region) Reorganisation Order 1989. From this time, Lambton Harbour Management was wholly owned by Wellington City Council but operated separately. Wellington Harbour Board was officially dissolved on 1 November 1989. ==Chairmen of Wellington Harbour Board==

The following is a complete list of chairmen of Wellington Harbour Board. ==See also==