Wharves in Wellington Harbour have been essential to the operation of the Port of Wellington and to the development of the city and the lower half of the North Island of New Zealand.
There are 20 wharves situated around Wellington Harbour. These include large wharves in the inner harbour and port area, smaller wharves in seaside suburbs and fuel wharves at Point Howard and Evans Bay. The first wharves were built from 1840 by newly arrived European settlers, to enable them to move goods from ship to shore. The first publicly owned wharf built in Wellington Harbour was Queens Wharf, completed in 1862. Wharves were built for various purposes – moving fuel, primary products such as timber, wool and meat coming from the hinterland, and other goods and passengers. Wharves for passenger vessels included berths for ferries transporting commuters and day trippers to and from the city and suburbs, and larger inter-island ferries going to Picton and Lyttelton. The wharves also serviced passenger liners from overseas and TEAL flying boats.
Wellington Harbour Board was created in 1880 and took control of most wharves in the harbour until its disestablishment in 1989. At that time a commercial company, Port of Wellington (now called CentrePort Wellington), took over management of most industrial wharves, while Wellington City Council and Hutt City Council gained control of most suburban wharves.
Over time Wellington's wharves have been altered, upgraded, extended, truncated or buried in reclamation along the shoreline of Wellington Harbour. Many wharves have been repurposed in response to changing domestic and international conditions and requirements for maritime transport of passengers and cargo.
Inner harbour
Early private wharves
Wellington Harbour's first wharves were privately owned, built by businessmen to facilitate movement of goods from ships to warehouses and shops. Goods were transhipped from deep-sea vessels to lighters and then to the shore. The names of these early private wharves changed as their ownership changed: for example, Hickson's wharf was also known as Ridgway's Wharf, Wills' Wharf and Houghton's Wharf.
The first wharf built may have been one constructed by J. H. Wallace, opposite Bowen Street. A newspaper article in 1930 described the wharf: "its construction was of the simplest. An empty dry-goods hogshead was carried out as far below low-water mark as it could be placed. When it was filled with stones it constituted the outer pier. Rough wooden trestles were placed at intervals in the intervening space, on which were laid some long straight logs, bound together by wooden ties, and squared on top by the nimble use of an adze".
Other early wharves include Tod's Wharf, in operation by September 1840; Taine's Wharf, built by James John Taine who arrived in Wellington in 1840 and soon built a wharf opposite his premises in Lambton Quay; and Rhodes' Wharf, constructed in 1841 by William Barnard Rhodes. He built a wharf near what is now the Michael Fowler Centre carpark at lower Cuba Street to provide access to his goods store and iron store. Baron Charles Ernest von Alzdorf, land agent and hotelier, built a wharf opposite his hotel. Alzdorf's Wharf was said to have been left high and dry fifty feet from the water after the 1855 earthquake raised the seabed.
By the early 1860s many of these small private wharves were needing repairs and were no longer suitable for serving the larger ships that had begun visiting Wellington.
Queens Wharf (1862) From 1856, Wellington Chamber of Commerce began calling on the provincial government to fund construction of a large publicly owned wharf that could serve steamers on the Panama route. Queens Wharf, possibly named by local man Thomas McKenzie in honour of Queen Victoria, opened in 1862 as Wellington's first public wharf and is Wellington's oldest extant wharf. The original wharf was constructed from timber, with totara piles. It was long with two cross tees extending on each side. The wharf was extended several times as harbour reclamation occurred and larger ships arrived, beginning in 1865–67 with a extension seawards, followed by a new cross section long, extensions to the original cross sections, and the addition of a steam crane and goods sheds.
Queens Wharf was managed by the Provincial Council and then Wellington City Council until Wellington Harbour Board was created in 1880. Queens Wharf became the Harbour Board's operational base and was the port’s main wharf until the advent of container shipping in the 1970s. Two historical buildings on Jervois Quay at the entrance to Queens Wharf date from the Harbour Board era: the Wellington Harbour Board Head Office and Bond Store (1892) and the Wellington Harbour Board Wharf Office Building (1896). Art Nouveau gates made of iron were installed in 1899 between these buildings at the wharf entrance.
During the 1913 Great Strike, supporters broke through gates and barricades at Queens Wharf and Kings Wharf and boarded ships in an attempt to stop strike-breakers from working. They also stopped goods vehicles and racehorses heading for Christchurch from entering Queens Wharf.
In 1989 the Harbour Board was disestablished and a new company (Port of Wellington, now CentrePort Wellington) took over management of port operations. The seafront from Shed 21 near the railway station to Clyde Quay, which includes Queens Wharf, was handed to Wellington City Council. In the 1990s Lambton Harbour Management, a company controlled by Wellington City Council, was involved in developing Queens Wharf as an entertainment area. Two large buildings, Queens Wharf Retail Centre and Queens Wharf Events Centre, opened in 1995. They were designed by the architect to look like wharf sheds. The retail centre was an immediate failure, and the building was sold in 1998 to be converted into office space. The events centre, now known as TSB Arena, still operates and hosts music concerts, sports and other events. Two old goods sheds on the wharf, Shed 3 and Shed 5, were turned into restaurants.
In 2001, Waterfront Investments proposed to build a Hilton Hotel on the outer tee of Queens Wharf. Greater Wellington Regional Council supported the proposed hotel, but a public survey showed that 86% of those surveyed did not want a hotel at this location. In 2009 the Environment Court turned down the proposal, stating that "building a five-star hotel on a public wharf was inconsistent with the sustainable use of natural and physical resources".
Three cranes are displayed on the wharf. One of them, a level luffing crane built in 1951 by Stothert & Pitt, is thought to be the only one of its type in New Zealand. There is a Stothert & Pitt tripod gantry crane, one of ten bought in 1966 that operated on Glasgow Wharf until containerisation arrived, and the third crane is a Series 520 Straddle Carrier used in the early days of container shipping.
There is a memorial to Paddy the Wanderer at the entrance to Queens Wharf, outside the Wharf Office Building. Paddy was a dog which used to roam the waterfront during the 1930s, befriending sailors and wharf workers. The memorial includes a bronze likeness of Paddy, a drinking fountain and drinking bowls below for dogs. Erected in 1945, it was paid for by people who knew Paddy and includes stones from London's Waterloo Bridge, bombed during World War II.
Railway Wharf (1880) Railway Wharf was Wellington's second deep-water wharf after Queens Wharf. It was built by the government and completed in April 1880 on newly reclaimed land near the Railway Station. Control of the wharf passed to Wellington Harbour Board after the Wellington Harbour Board and Corporation Land Act came into effect on 1 September 1880. From the start the wharf was designed to have rail access to facilitate handling of goods, and three separate lines were laid down. The wharf was angled on a north-north-west /south-south-east axis, the same as Queens Wharf, because at the time it was important to moor vessels "fore-and-aft" to align with Wellington's prevailing winds. From 1906 to 1951, Railway Wharf was Wellington's main wharf for unloading coal. In 1951 the railway lines were removed, and the wharf was extended and converted to become the base for the inter-island ferry to Lyttelton which had previously been at Waterloo Quay Wharf. Ferries to Picton also operated from this wharf. The wharf was renamed the Inter-Island Wharf, with the first ferries berthing in 1954. The wharf was altered again when roll-on/roll-off ferries were introduced, but after 1975 the wharf was no longer used by ferries. Railway Wharf is managed by CentrePort.
Waterloo Quay Wharf (1883) The wharf now known as Waterloo Quay Wharf was completed in 1883, the first wharf built after Wellington Harbour Board was established in 1880. The wharf was built to serve the wool trade and was known as Wool Wharf or Wool Jetty. A shed that could hold 6000 bales of wool was built at the city end of the wharf. Originally the wharf was connected to land by a bridge, until the space between was reclaimed by 1906. Over the years the wharf has been altered and extended. In 1916 it was converted to serve the inter-island ferry to Lyttelton and until 1953 was known at first as the Wellington-Lyttelton Ferry Wharf, and later Lyttelton Wharf. The ferry terminal was then moved to Railway Wharf, and from about that time Lyttelton Wharf became Waterloo Quay Wharf, used by coastal trading ships. For many years until 2009 the Police Maritime Unit operated from Shed 19 on the wharf. The wharf was also used as a base for the Lynx and other fast ferries. Waterloo Quay Wharf is controlled by CentrePort.
Ferry Wharf (1897) Ferry Wharf, also known as Ferry Wharf no. 1 to distinguish it from Tug Wharf (or Ferry Wharf no. 2) built beside it some years later, is located immediately west of Waterloo Quay Wharf. J H Williams had begun a ferry service to Days Bay in 1895, and Wellington Harbour Board wanted to take pressure off busy Queens Wharf. Ferry Wharf came into use in 1897, with additions in 1906 and 1912–1914. The wharf was connected to land by a bridge until reclamation was carried out. In 1912, Wellington Harbour Board built a ferry terminal building at the head of the wharf for the Wellington Ferry Company. Eastbourne Borough Council leased the building from the Harbour Board and operated a ferry service to Eastbourne until 1948. The building then had various occupiers until 2009, when it became the base for the Police Maritime Unit and national dive squad. The Eastbourne Ferry Building is listed as a Historic Place Category 2 by Heritage New Zealand.
Glasgow Wharf (1901) The Harbour Board approved plans and funding for a new road and railway wharf in 1898–1899, as part of a larger scheme of harbour reclamation and development. The wharf was named Glasgow Wharf after the late governor, the Earl of Glasgow. It was about long and wide and constructed of imported ironbark timber. The wharf was completed in November 1901 at a cost of about £60,000 including sheds and cranes. The Evening Post reported that "the wharf is in all respects the finest structure of the kind in the southern hemisphere". An innovative feature at the time was the installation of ten gantry cranes, built by the Hydraulic Engineering Company of Chester, which were said to be better for working on big ships than the cranes then in use at Queens Wharf. The wharf handled frozen meat and produce needing cold storage.
The wharf has been upgraded several times. In 1966 the Harbour Board installed 10 new electric tripod gantry cranes. These were then made obsolete by the introduction of containerisation. One crane was restored and is now on display at Queens Wharf.
From 1992 until 2004, Glasgow Wharf was the base for the Straitsman ferry, and since 2003 Bluebridge ferries have operated from the wharf. The wharf is managed by CentrePort and is not open to the public.