Mount Victoria, also known as Matairangi and colloquially as Mt Vic, is a prominent hill immediately to the east of central Wellington, New Zealand. Mount Victoria gives its name to the suburb of Mount Victoria on its west. The suburbs of Oriental Bay to the north, Roseneath and Hataitai to the east and Newtown to the south border Mount Victoria and climb its slopes. Mount Victoria is known for its views over Wellington and is a popular recreational area. The summit lookout is a popular visitor destination, providing 360° views of Wellington city and suburbs, Wellington Harbour, Evans Bay and the Miramar Peninsula.
Etymology Mount Victoria's original Māori name was , though is also used. The first name derives from a legend in which two (mythological creatures) tried to escape from Wellington Harbour which was then an enclosed lake. One became stranded and died, and its spirit turned into a bird named Te Keo, which flew to the top of the mountain and mourned (tangi). The second name translates as "to examine the sky".
Geography and geology Mount Victoria is a hill to the east of central Wellington. From the northwest (Oriental Bay) to the east (Roseneath and Hataitai) the hill's steep slopes reach down to the shoreline and separate the inner part of Wellington Harbour from Evans Bay. A road, partly built on reclaimed land, passes along the shoreline from Oriental Bay around Point Jerningham to Kilbirnie. A long, low ridge known in Māori as Te Ranga a Hiwi ("the hill ridge of Hiwi") extends southwards from the summit, with a 133-metre peak named Mount Alfred about 1 km from the summit of Mount Victoria, just above the Mount Victoria Tunnel. To the west of the ridge is the suburb of Mount Victoria and the Basin Reserve, and to the east lie Hataitai and Melrose.
There are several notable places on or adjacent to the lower flanks of the ridge from Mount Victoria to Newtown, particularly at the southern end. To the west are the grounds of Government House, Wellington Hospital, Alexandra Park, the Vice-Regal Playground, Wellington College, Wellington East Girls' College and the Gifford Observatory. To the east of the ridgeline is Hataitai Park, which includes a velodrome, netball courts and sports fields, and the Badminton Wellington Centre lies to the south of the park.
The only watercourse of note on Mount Victoria is the Waipapa Stream, which originates from two headwater branches on the Hataitai side of Mount Victoria and travels down the valley in Hataitai to Evans Bay. The Waipapa Stream was culverted in the early twentieth century.
Torlesse Complex rocks (alternating greywacke sandstone and mudstone (argillite), known as Wellington Greywacke) underlie Mount Victoria. The Wellington Greywacke rocks are "metamorphosed, highly deformed and variably weathered".
In 1863 a Mr Haybittle reported finding quartz containing gold on Mount Victoria and on a beach below. In 1870 the Wellington Independent reported that a tunnel of 100 feet had been driven into the Evans Bay side of Mount Victoria in the hope of finding a gold-bearing quartz reef. This was hoped to be linked to the one at Ngauranga.
Wind
Wellington is prone to strong winds and the top of Mount Victoria is completely exposed.Windy Wellington, Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, retrieved 10 August 2024 Writing in 1909, journalist Frank Morton described the wind on reaching the top of Mount Victoria on a particularly unpleasant day as being "like coming butt up against a very stalwart ox running full-speed down-hill. It was the sort of wind that blows a man's eyes into his head while it gives him a clean shave". He said that the best way to calculate the wind velocity on Mount Victoria was to take the wind speed in Willis Street, a street in the commercial district of Wellington, and multiply it by a factor of 10.
On 13 October 1883 part of the flagstaff at the Signal Station was destroyed in a severe gale, and in 1907 the keeper at the signal station was blown over a bank, suffering injuries that resulted his death months later.
When the Gateways apartment block was built on an exposed ridge at Roseneath in the 1960s, the chairman of the building's management organisation reported that pressure build-up during a strong north westerly wind made it impossible to open any balcony door "and our women occupiers in particular, are imprisoned in the building, and on occasions, male occupiers must use the fire escape to leave the building". Several tenants were hospitalised after being blown over. The wind problem was so bad that doors in the building had to be redesigned.
Vegetation
Writing in 1921, historian and amateur archaeologist Henry Maynard Christie noted that:In pre-pakeha days the [Hataitai] valley had presented a pleasing picture, with its heavy timber growing on the slopes and along the banks of the [Waipapa] stream. That the place had been heavily wooded is almost certain by the presence or quantities of logs and roots of matai, miro, rata, and some of the soft woods, that have been dug from adjacent bogs. In ditching and road-forming on the swamps at the back of Moxham Avenue, some very substantial timber was uncovered.Although parts of Mount Victoria may have supported a temperate broadleaf-podocarp forest before human habitation, any such forest had long disappeared by 1840 when European settlers arrived. At that time, the north-facing slopes of Mount Victoria were covered with "scrubby plants such as manuka, kanuka, tauhinu, flax, fern and native grasses", as well as matagouri. North-facing slopes were dry and exposed, with strong north-west winds and little surface fresh water. Sheep and cattle were grazed on Mount Victoria from the 1840s. They trod down the fern and scrubby plants, allowing grasses to displace them. By the 1860s Mount Victoria was windswept and exposed and covered in grass pasture. Gorse and broom were planted as hedges but soon got out of control and were also a fire hazard.
From the 1870s, planting of conifers such as radiata pine and macrocarpa began at the base of Mount Victoria around the asylum (now Government House), Wellington College and Pirie Street. Conifers were good at handling north-westerly gales, clay soil and dry conditions. Further conifer plantings were made on Mount Victoria and other parts of the Town Belt from the 1880s to 1932, and many of these trees still survive. Eucalyptus and pōhutukawa were also planted during this period.
More recently, aging pine trees have been selectively removed and areas of Mount Victoria have been replanted with native trees and shrubs. Wellington City Council notes that "a return to native vegetation would result in low diversity coastal forest on the higher ground with taller species confined to the moister gullies".
History
Māori settlements Before the arrival of Europeans there were two known pā (fortified settlements) on Mount Victoria. Historian Elsdon Best recorded that the ancient name of Point Jerningham was Omarukaikaru, and that Te Waiherere Pā ("gushing water") was located on the headland above the point, possibly where Roseneath School is now. A house at the pā was called Waipuna ("a spring"). The name of the pā and principal dwelling imply that there was a water source nearby. A notable chief at this pā was Te Rangi-Kai-Kore.
Ngāi Tara people lived in Te Akatarewa Pā, which was said to be located approximately above the tunnels on the Te Ranga a Hiwi ridge south of the summit. Historian Leslie Adkin states that a food cultivation area near the Basin Reserve (which was formerly a swamp or wetland) was connected to the pā. Hinekiri, daughter of Te Rangi-Kai-Kore, lived at Te Akatarewa and was said to be the person who named Motu Kairangi, the ancient name of the Miramar Peninsula in the days when it was still an island. Te Ranga a Hiwi ridge is named for Hiwi, a son of Hinekiri.
By 1850, there were no pā on Mount Victoria. A 1925 newspaper report stated that in the early nineteenth century invading Muaupoko, Ngati Rauru, Ngāti Apa and Ngāti Ruanui under Te Kopara had destroyed Waiherere Pā and Te Akatarewa Pā, along with Uruhau Pā at Island Bay. Writing in 1959, Adkin stated that no trace of Te Akatarewa Pā remained.
Town Belt
Mount Victoria is within the area of land set aside to provide access to green areas for all the town's citizens when Wellington was laid out by the New Zealand Company in 1840. The Wellington Town Belt was intended to be a "broad belt of land, which [...] the Company intends to be public property, on condition that no buildings ever be erected upon it".City Parks and green spaces, Te Ara the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, Quoted in Walter Cook, 'Wellington's town belt – a people's park and a heritage for everyone. The 1991 Ian Galloway Memorial Lecture.' Horticulture in New Zealand 2, no. 2 (Winter 1991), p.15. Te Ara – The Encyclopedia of New Zealand accessed 17 February 2016
In spite of the intention to preserve the land for the public, sections of the Town Belt have been built upon. The Provincial Government took 143 acres of Town Belt at Mount Victoria for what is now Wellington College in 1874, and for Wellington Hospital including a lunatic asylum in 1876.Wellington City Reserves Act 1872 - Section 2 and 3 as defined by the First Schedule of the Act A further 5 acres were set apart for a signal station. In 1909, 2.5 acres were set aside for a water reservoir to service the housing areas being built on the higher slopes of Mount Victoria in the suburbs of Mount Victoria, Oriental Bay, and Roseneath. This was followed by central government taking land for Wellington East Girls' College in 1925. Over one million exotic trees, mostly pines, macrocarpa and eucalyptus, were planted on the Town Belt between 1924 and 1944.
Farming Sheep and cattle were farmed on Mount Victoria for a number of years from the 1840s, with Wellington's Town Board (now the City Council) tendering out land leases. In May 1877 a letter from a Wellington resident was published in The New Zealand Times, pointing out that lessees of the Town Belt, including Mount Victoria, did not have the right to lease the land, and fencing should not be erected by them on the land as it was open to the public. This appears to have been ignored by the Council as in June 1877 it was announced that almost 900 acres of the Town Belt were to be leased for 14 years, including almost 70 acres on Mount Victoria. All the leases that remained at the end of 1911 were terminated by the Council.
Roads During the 19th century, several tracks were established through the Town Belt on Mount Victoria to connect the city and Newtown to Roseneath, Kilbirnie and points further east. As the city developed, demand grew for roads that could take a horse and cart, and later on, motor vehicles.
Constable Street was extended to Kilbirnie over the hill at the southern end of the Mount Victoria ridge in the late 1860s, but the grade was steep so in 1905 a cutting was made to improve access to Kilbirnie. Carlton Gore Road from Oriental Bay up the hill to Roseneath was formed in the 1890s and improved in the 1920s. This road is notable as an early civil engineering project: the roadway is cantilevered out from the hillside and there is a hairpin bend halfway up.
With the opening up of Hataitai for development in the early 1900s, the developers explored ways of connecting the suburb to the city by either a tunnel or a road across Mount Victoria. The Council deemed a tunnel preferable to a steep road over the hill, and the Hataitai Bus Tunnel was opened in 1907 for trams only. Pedestrians still had to walk over the hill.