Talk:Wellington

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A Winner of the March 2005 West Dakota Prize

This entry is one of only seventeen that have won the March 2005 West Dakota Prize for successfully employing the expression "legend states" in a complete sentence. --Wetman 08:02, 6 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] [Untitled]

Most of the comments below seem quite old, so I'm going to start updating this page by myself, but I will talk about what I'm doing here in case anyone wants to be involved.

I've cut out the "infamous for its wind" comment, and written a couple of introductory paragraphs, to be a bit more upbeat. A section on weather is probably appropriate, and the wind is definitely relevent for that.
I think the distinction between "greater Wellington" and "lesser Wellington" is always going to be a vague one. This page will inevitably serve to describe both, so I don't think we should fight it. I think we should follow this policy:
- This page refers primarily to the Wellington urban area as a whole (including Hutt Valley/Porirua) and secondarily to the area covered by the Wellington City Council. I would expect a Sydney page to tell me about the whole metropolitan area, not just a local government area.
- Content specific to Upper Hutt, Lower Hutt or Porirua should go on their respective entries, but content specific to central Wellington should stay here.
- The Wellington Region page should stay. Most countries have second-tier units (states, provinces). New Zealand has regions. The Wellington Region page reflects this. The Wellington Region covers the Wairarapa and the Kapiti Coast as well as the four cities of Wellington.
There needs to be a structure to the page, much in the same way as national pages are divided... maybe Introduction, People, Events, Climate, History

Ben Arnold

Ignore the above and look see the section further down where I talk about the new Wellington City article. Ben Arnold 10:36, 2 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Wellington applies to the major city, but the also applies to the region (provincial administration level) that encompass the greater urban area known by the same name. The Wellington region is administered by the Wellington Regional Council, while Wellington (not Wellington City) is administered by the Wellington City Council. The city and the region are known as Wellington but the primary meaning of Wellington is the city, with the region as a secondary meaning. Since Wellington City, New Zealand is rather obscure and using Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand seems totally redundant, very obscure and both are still ambiguous, I have left Wellington, New Zealand for the city unchanged and added Wellington (region), New Zealand for the greater urban area, with cross linking on both pages. Is this a reasonable approach? -- kiwiinapanic 16:46 Dec 31, 2002 (UTC)

I created the first version of the Wellington article. I realised there were several places named "Wellington" in the world, so made Wellington a disambiguation and Wellington, New Zealand to refer to the city. These days, it seems like a mistake: the city is the topic that most articles want to link to. Even the Wellington region is relatively unimportant (you can see this by looking at the "what links here" list on the Wellington page). So using current naming conventions, the disambiguation list should be at Wellington (disambiguation) and the city should be moved to Wellington. ( 09:36 20 Jul 2003 (UTC)

It is the southernmost capital city in the world - what about Port Stanley, Falkland Islands? -- Zoe

Are the Falkland Islands a true country or just a protectorate of the UK? -- kiwiinapanic 12:46 Jan 31, 2003 (UTC)

Or Melbourne at 38 degrees south?Mind you. Melbourne stopped being the capital of Oz in 1927.

Wellington is 41 degrees south! And it is the capital of a country, not a state within a country. -- kiwiinapanic 12:46 Jan 31, 2003 (UTC)

A question for the NZ experts, one that I can't seem to find an answer to anywhere on this page or related ones - how did Wellington come to be the capital? A para on this woud be interesting. Tannin 03:12 Jan 29, 2003 (UTC)

I do not claim to be an expert - I only live and work here - but I think it had something to do with the abolition of the provincial governments over a hundred years ago. I will have a look around and see what I can find out as all that history is missing from the NZ pages generally. -- kiwiinapanic 12:46 Jan 31, 2003 (UTC)

Thanks Cameron. I'll look forward to seeing it. Tannin (Reminder to self: revise the appropriate Australian entry to flesh out the way that Canberra was chosen as Australia's capital - the tale doesn't seem to be told with any flavour at present.)

I noted this request and added a paragraph about it, based on info at the WCC website. -- Ppe42

[edit] Why Wellington?

From the article,

"Apparently there was concern that the southern regions, where the goldfields were located, would form a separate colony. Commissioners from Australia were of the opinion that Wellington was suitable because of its harbour and central location."

New Zealand/Australia were founded as multiple colonies.. it was only through a local government process that the countries became seperate.. as all the Australian states decided to join together as a union, and asked NZ to join.. NZ declined. The choice of Wellington as capital follows the reasoning of most countries too, that is choosing a "politically correct" and geographically unbiased location but in an independant location. Even in the USA today, the capital is not in New York or LA.. AUstralia follows suit, as does Brazil etc.. (interestingly not the UK). Back in the goldrush the South Island economy was amping majorly, and it was put to a vote to become a seperate country (again remember these colonies were not founded as independant countries, the borders got sorted out later by political means). The North Island rejected this proposal through voting numbers and continued to become the powerhouse of the NZ economy, especially Auckland. Though interesting to note, as most created capitals, Wellington enjoys the highest average wage for a NZ city now.

[edit] Location and demographics - 1,100 people??

Is this really right, from Location and demographics ?

The area administered by the Wellington City Council includes 1,100 people who live outside the urban area in the adjacent rural communities of Makara and Ohariu.

It's just that 1,100 people out of 363,400 seems such an incredibly small number to even note - I know it could be right, of course, but equally I wondered if it's lost a zero or something? I will look forward to some well-informed local putting me right on this! :) --Nevilley 11:30, 30 May 2004 (UTC)

That was me, I was having a pedantic day. It's true there are about 1,100 people -- no zeros missing -- and it's true also that they're too few to note, at least in article about greater Wellington. I'll go and edit now. 210.86.47.175 10:17, 29 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Hey, the mere 700 (seven hundred, two zeroes) residents of the Chatham Islands get their own Time Zone, and that this is mentioned on the main New Zealand page. Silenceisfoo 13:30, 1 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Loved that groovy town!

Oh, and is this Talk page entirely the wrong place to say how very, very much I liked Wellington?? Cos I did! :) --Nevilley 11:31, 30 May 2004 (UTC)

[edit] CBD stuff

The figures about numbers of people working in the CBDs are derived from 2001 Census figures. I should put the detail in a footnote. For Auckland I included the area units of Auckland Harbourside, Auckland Central West, Auckland Central East, Grafton West, Grafton East and Freeman's Bay. For Wellington I used the area units of Thorndon-Tinakori Rd, Lambton and Willis St-Cambridge Tce. Ben Arnold 07:33, 8 Aug 2004 (UTC)

[edit] 1840 shoreline plaques

I thought that the 1840 shoreline plaques were the position before the extrensive land reclamation took place. the first stage of land reclaimation began in 1940. The earthquake section says that they were the position of the shore before the earthquakes but if this were the case surely the dates of the quakes would be morte appropriate?

The date reflects that that was when the Treaty of Waitangi was signed. There were major earthquakes in 1855 and 1940 along with the man-made reclamation. Those have significantly changed the shoreline. --Gregstephens 08:21, 8 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Something should be entered in regared to the size of wellington CBD in comparison of other NZ Cities. For example Wellington is the largest CBD in the country by some way. Also something to do with "density" - Wellington is one of the most densely populated city's in Australasia203.144.32.165 01:30, 25 August 2006 (UTC)Me

[edit] Suburbs

I've rejigged the suburbs section so that it takes up a bit less space and is arranged geographically (as the suburbs of all the other cities in NZ now are, too). Can't help thinking that it might look better as a subsection of "Demographics", though... any thoughts? [[User:Grutness|Grutness ^hello? ]] 01:17, 17 Dec 2004 (UTC)

[edit] New Wellington City article

The Auckland page has successfully employed the technique of creating a separate article to describe the territorial authority. Having seen this done I can now see the benefits and I've done the same thing for Wellington. It makes the complicated geographical concepts a lot clearer and it will give us somewhere to house all that really specific stuff (like suburbs, schools, etc), without cluttering the main Wellington article. I hope nobody disagrees with this too vehemently.

So we now have three articles:

Wellington refers to the Wellington Urban Area, just as London refers to the London metropolitan area or Sydney refers to the meteropolitan area of Sydney
Wellington City refers to the district of Wellington City Council
Wellington Region refers to the area within the jurisdiction of the Wellington Regional Council

I still argue that we shouldn't have separate territorial authority articles in cases like Whangarei, Rotorua, etc. where the district is no more than an extension of the urban area into the rural hinterland. In these cases I think it should suffice to have a section of the article dedicated to the territorial authority.

Ben Arnold 10:36, 2 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Thanks Ben, I more or less agree. in the other article i wrote: Two articles about Wellington City? a short one with the correct name and a long one with the short form, that is ambiguous? The legal geographic situation is that Wellington City (a T/A) exists as multiple areas of meshblocks and area units, and Wellington Region exists as an aggregate of 8 multiple T/A's. Wellington Suburb is newly proclaimed by Wellington City Council, and shouldn't offer any issues. Greater Wellington is an aggregate of 4 T/A's ( a community of common interest). I suggest that we have 4 articles, with each one appearing on the Wellington disambiguation page, but I imagine you will collectively prefer longer names: Wellington Region, New Zealand or something like that? please comment before this escalates too far. moza 16:57, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Changed photo caption "wooden"

The first photo now refers to "wooden" buidings on the left. Is whoever made this change to the caption absolutely sure those buildings are made of wood?

Absolutely ☺. The largest wooden building in the Southern Hemisphere. Built to look like stone. Big fire risk. From a quick search you can find proof at New Zealand Parliament Buildings and in Places to Visit at http://www.wellingtonnz.com/AboutWellington/

BTW, please use the four tildes to sign your posts.

Barefootguru 00:42, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

Well they fooled me — they sure do look like stone. But I never got close enough to see beyond the illusion. Thanks for responding JShook | Talk 12:55, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

Upon reflection, I still feel that referring to these buildings as "wooden" — while true — is distracting. Nowhere in the article text is this referred to, and in the photo (and at the site) the buildings look like they are made of stone, as they were evidently intended to do. Only by following a link at the end of the article and reading to near the end of the linked-to page does one find confirmation that the buildings are in fact made of wood. The fact that they are made of wood is indeed interesting, but that it can be verified only by reading another article makes the pedantry of the caption confusing in the context of the article in which it appears. JShook | Talk 17:16, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

If have no great affinity for the caption, feel free to adjust. I changed it because it stated they were part of the government buildings complex, which is incorrect. Barefootguru 18:51, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

Well, the inaccuracy of the original caption was all mine. I just grabbed this picture while waiting on the steps of the RR station. I'll edit it ever so slightly. JShook | Talk 20:45, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Notable Wellingtonians: Criteria for inclusion?

I notice Darius_Dhlomo has added a few Field Hockey players to the Notable Wellingtonians section (this revision, for future reference - if it's changed). I realise they're high profile players in that sport, but if we're going to start including successful sports people in there, what are the criteria going to be? Is Kyle Pontifex more worthy of a link than Johnny Bares? The only All Black, for example, in the current list is the captain Tana Umaga. Should the list be expanded to include other notable sports people? Ex-or-current world champs like Melissa Moon, Jonathan Wyatt and Kate McIllroy?

How about captains of national sports teams, and individuals (or members of teams) who have had a top 3 finish in their respective World Championships? Thoughts?

--noizyboy 21:46, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Links section

I removed some non-Wellington links a few days ago but more have just been added:

Victoria University of Wellington
Wellington International Airport
City Gallery, Wellington
Wellington Zoo

I think we should stick to links about Wellington *itself* rather than places in Wellington, otherwise it's quickly going to get out of hand (i.e. remove the above), but what do others think? Barefootguru 04:58, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

The problem is that these links are all perfectly relevant. The city is a big place, though - too big for all the inks we'd need. I think we should make a new page - attractions in Wellington - perhaps on WikiTravel? Then we could store all the relevant links there, with descriptions, pictures, and links to their own articles (eg Te Papa). The links should be important though - big attractions and not just link spam for every restaurant and conference center. Perhaps the Famous Wellingtonians should be a separate page too? Ppe42 09:51, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, the Category:Wellington_Region is already linked, and wikitravel:Wellington already includes all the things to see and do in Wellington… If no better ideas or objections are forthcoming I'll prune the links and add one to Wikitravel. Barefootguru 07:47, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

I've removed a couple of links which were covered by the Wellington Region category (I think that's a better option than Wikitravel), and put an HTML comment in there about limiting how many we have. Barefootguru 23:49, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Public transport

I've just created an article on public transport in Wellington. Trouble is, I'm not sure where to put a link — the page doesn't seem to have a See Also section. Any thoughts? -- Vardion 23:14, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

It has a See Also now ;-) Nice article. Barefootguru 23:47, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

This is great, but I came to the article looking for information on transport and there is nothing in the main body of the article. There must be other ways to get around Wellington, roads etc. Having it as a small link which was difficult to find is not ideal. I suggest creating a section in the article called "Transport", and just under the heading, have something like

Main article: public transport in Wellington

or even better ...

Main article: Transport in Wellington

! --Biatch 05:26, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] What is "Vodafone X*Air"?

This large picture of a recent event is attractive but not very informative to a non-Wellingtonian. It apears to be some sort of aquatic event. A more informative caption might justify this photo's inclusion, size and significance. JShook | Talk 13:58, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Mayor

The urban area has no mayor. Each council does. I've removed it and replaced it with " various, see each council". --GeLuxe 08:54, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Iron Duke

I would support adding Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington to the dab header, now it exists. Many people will come here looking for him, just as many come here looking for the City of Wellington. Septentrionalis 18:42, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Capital of New Zealand

Why was there a three-year gap between the first sitting of the parliament in Wellington, and the time it became the official capital? Why did the parliament go back and sit in Auckland in ~~1963~~ 1863? In what way was Wellington designated as the capital? Is it explicitly designated capital, or simply because it is the location of the parliament? Thank you. — Insta ntnood 06:27, 6 May 2006 (UTC) (fixed 20:47, 8 May 2006 (UTC))

The decision to move was made in November 1864, the move took place in early 1865, and the buildings were opened in July 1865. New buildings were opened in 1866 on the current site. But the first suggestion to move was in 1863. (John E. Martin 2004 The House, Dunmore Press) --Midnight tonight 03:04, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

The Parliament sat in Wellington in 1862, and it went back and sat in Auckland in 1863. Is Wellington explicitly designated the capital? Or is it like London? — Insta ntnood 20:47, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

Wellington has been explicitly the capital since the 1860s. Parliament could however decide to shift location if it saw the need (extremely unlikely) Mostlyharmless 04:46, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

In what way is it explicitly designated? Was there a law or statute passed by the parliament? Why did it sit in Wellington in 1862, and back in Auckland in 1863? — Insta ntnood 19:38, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

Is Wellington or the Wellington City the capital? — Insta ntnood 15:24, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

When the Gov-Gen summons Parliament, they summon it to met in the "City of Wellington", not in Wellington. So Wellington City is correctly the capital. --Midnighttonight Remind me to do my uni work rather than procrastinate on the internet 03:33, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] X Air pic

The X Air pic was removed because it is not about the city. All the other photos are either of Wellington, or something unique to Wellington. The X Air games is neither. Hence, I have removed it. --Midnight tonight 09:23, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Helengrad

I noticed that info was merged in from Helengrad to this article. It would be much more appropiate on the Helen Clark page, but even there- this level of info is too much. It is really quite a small thing and would be unbalanced, but it would be even worse here. I support Wallie's removal of it [1]. --Midnight tonight 07:38, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

Lived in Wellington all my life and NEVER heard the term Helengrad before. Enzedbrit 01:07, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, I know. It's meant to mean that Helen Clark has an iron grip on the city, like Stalin and Stalingrad. But it's just lame. --Midnight tonight 02:47, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

I never heard that before either. Surely "Kerrygrad" would be more fitting? Petrouchka 02:32, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Photos

I added a small panorama of Civic Square. I think I'll go out and re-shoot it sometime soon, to show more of the square. Does anyone have any suggestions, or have a request for other night shots to use in the main or related articles? — Soupisgoodfood 22:09, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

While not a night shot... Karori Wildlife Sanctury could have some cool pics. Also, from the wind mill doing a 360. Or a really nice one would be from Somes Island (and that could be done at night)! Ummm, that's all I can think of. And that pic is really good.--Midnight tonight 00:11, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

Yes a cool pic Soupisgoodfood (lol at user name), I put it on the Civic Square article as well, and put headings and cat on that, so thats a teensy respectable and no longer a stub. although still stubbish.. There are many interesting subjects around Civic Square, esp up on that bridge. Did you know that pyramidal building is aligned to the celestial south pole? Art, Astronomy and Architecture come together in Wgtn. see Astro_Art I have literally thousands of pics of Wellington, but hard to know where to put any in that main article, we all appreciate your offer to get specific pics. The airport from Melrose is cool. The Hutt valley from Mt Vic? I am out nearly every full moon using buildings etc looking for interesting compositions, see my wiki gallery at User:Paul_Moss/gallery its getting a bit of a bulge though, sorry.moza 00:53, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

I think what I'll do is take a simiar shot to the one I took but much wider, and keep that one in the Wellington article, then take another panorama from the other side, but just use that in the Civic Square article.

Perhaps replacing the current image of Te Papa with one shot from near the crane (in the day) is a good way getting a bit more of Welly in the article without adding more photos. I don't think you'd be able to see the enterance, though, but there would still be one in the Te Papa article. Not sure if this is important or not.

I've added a todo list in my user page where I've listed the photos I currently aim to get.

You have some nice photos in your gallery. Unfortunatly, I couldn't load most of them since I've gone over my limit and currently at dial-up speeds :( — Soupisgoodfood 12:32, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wellington city v City of Wellington

A lot of this article confuses the two. The Court of Arms is of the City of Wellington (defined as being the under the governace of Wellington City Council), as opposed to Wellington (under the goverance of the Greater Wellington Regional Council). For instance, the Coat of Arms is C.o.W. (actually its the WCC coat of arms to be precise), and the sister cities are also the city councils.

This article is about Wellington, the place, which can be approximated by the Wellington Urban Area defined by Statistics New Zealand. There are separate articles on the City of Wellington and the Wellington Region which are units of local government, as well as articles on the other councils that administer parts of the Wellington conurbation: Upper Hutt, Porirua and Lower Hutt.

Material that is specific to the Wellington City Council or the area it administers should be moved to the Wellington City article. Statistics about "Wellington City" should go there; statistics about "Wellington Urban Area" should go here and statistics about "Wellington Region" should go to that article.

Ben Arnold 18:26, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] New Infobox

I've been frustrated by the infobox as it stood and the lack of a pretty picture at the top of the article. My solution was to go to the London article and adapt its infobox for our purposes. This has the spin-off benefit of being able to list the population of all the various areas side-by-side. I think it's good but I'm interested in hearing other people's opinions.

My subjective judgement is that the cable car photo is the best photo in the article, so that's why I've moved it to the top. I don't particularly like the location map for a couple of reasons and the sooner we can get a proper series of professional maps covering New Zealand, the better.

Ben Arnold 12:56, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

looking ok Ben, let me know what kind of map you would like, and I'll consider creating one for comment.moza 00:16, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

My concerns about the existing map are:

I'm pretty sure it's based on a map I've seen in the New Zealand yearbook, which is subject to copyright
The coastline is pretty approximate (although this only shows up at the higher resolution)
The boundary lines are of inconsistent thicknesses, particularly around Taranaki (thin) and Nelson (thick)
The dot to mark Wellington is pretty small, presumably because the creator of the map wanted to colour in the urban sprawl.
The line linking the dot to the text Wellington is non-standard. Normally the label would be alongside the dot, or omitted entirely (as seems to be the practice in many of the other location maps in Wikipedia).

I think we need a map like the one for Ipswich. The boundary files for councils are now "freely available" so we might as well get one of Wikipedia's expert map makers with the appropriate software to make us a series of maps of New Zealand we can place location dots on. I think we need:

A plain map of New Zealand with no boundaries, for putting location dots onto
A map of New Zealand with territorial authority boundaries
A map of New Zealand with regional council boundaries

We might also want an inset showing New Zealand's location in the world. I'll see if I can find somewhere where map makers hang out to refer them to this discussion. If you've got the software yourself then awesome!

Ben Arnold 11:38, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

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