Te Hā Noa Te Hā Noa Victoria Street linear park

About the project

Victoria Street will be transformed into a thriving place for movement, rest and recreation. It will become a place that connects and embraces our diverse and growing city centre. A more people focused and greener link across the city. A street that distinctly reflects Tāmaki Makaurau.  

We are beginning with the section of Victoria Street between Albert Street and Kitchener Street to support the opening of City Rail Link Aotea Station in 2024. Public engagement on the design and integration of this section is running from 6 October to 3 November 2021. Find out more details here.

Aotea Station, which is expected to be New Zealand’s busiest train station, will have two entrances on Victoria Street. Designs are underway for how the area around these entrances will be accessible and welcoming for the thousands of people who will arrive by bus and train every day.  

There may be an opportunity though future Long-Term Plan processes to seek funding for the upgrade of subsequent sections of Victoria Street. 

The City Centre Masterplan presents a 20-year vision that sets the direction for all the city centre and waterfront projects, ensuring our city is being shaped into a better connected, greener and people focussed city that we can be proud of. Te Hā Noa forms the centrepiece of the “green link” identified in the City Centre Masterplan (CCMP). The vision is to connect the city centre and the waterfront through a green linear park between Victoria and Albert Parks.   

When finished Te Hā Noa will form a key part in the revitalisation of the midtown area in Auckland’s city centre. 

What’s involved

Currently, there is not enough space for people on Victoria Street to rest, move and play as Auckland grows. The layout of Victoria Street   favours vehicles over people. When the CRL is built, and buses are shifted to Wellesely Street thousands of pedestrians will exit and enter the Aotea Station at peak times on to Victoria Street.  

Victoria Street also currently lacks a clear identity or sense of place as it consists of concrete, high rise buildings, glass and traffic, so we have been working with the community and Mana Whenua to tell our stories through Victoria Street and create an identity that feels distinctly Tāmaki Makaurau.  

A well-designed public realm is also integral to urban living, so Victoria Street will have new beautiful places for people to meet, gather and relax.  

We also see the importance of enhancing the urban biodiversity and green space in the city centre.  Improvements along Victoria Street will contribute to the environmental outcomes envisioned for the city centre and wider Auckland in line with the Low Carbon Strategic Action Plan, Auckland Climate Action Framework, Zero Waste Declaration C40, Auckland Growing Greener. 
 

Dates

Construction of the first stage of the project, the section of Victoria Street between Federal Street and Queen Street is currently planned for 2023 to align with City Rail Link’s work on Victoria Street and the Aotea Station entrances.

Further Information

To find out more about the project, please read the Indicative Business Case. 

Indicative Business Case

The Indicative Business Case (IBC) looks at the full length of the street between Waikōkota (Freemans Bay/ Victoria Park) and Rangipuke Albert Park. The IBC was commissioned to define the key benefits and drivers for the programme and determine a way forward for staged delivery.  It gives us a great vision of what a long-term development strategy for the street could look like.  The IBC showed that the indicative cost of delivering the full length of the project would be around $240 million.  The IBC was completed in was completed in May 2020. 

The Detailed Business Case (DBC) investigates in more detail the first section of the project identified through the IBC, allowing us to integrate the section we can build now (Federal to Queen Street) with the surrounding area to ensure we have a holistic design approach.  The DBC was completed in March 2021, please find a copy of the DBC below. Please get in contact if you would like to view any of the appendices - here.

Detailed Business Case

We are working in close partnership with Mana Whenua through the establishment of the project and outcomes. The project is privileged to have been gifted a working title from the Mana Whenua project working group: Te Hā Noa.

Te Hā Noa is to freely experience ones’ surroundings, to breathe and acknowledge the sights and sounds whilst journeying within the city centre and the link between Waikōkota and Rangipuke.

Te Hā – The breath in Māori terms is the essence of life itself, encompassing all the senses and Noa – is to be free within the journey to experience.

Journeying from the middle ridges that form through ways of breathing, create a pulse and rhythm of ‘Hā’ (breath) within the city centre and to the lower part of the city between Karangahape and the Waitematā.  Through this movement the ‘Hā’ is the hub, or nucleus, that brings into existence pockets of vitality and breathing life into the city; coming alive.

To find out more about our partnership with Mana Whenua on this project please read our Cultural Design Framework. 

Delivered by

Auckland Council 

• 09 301 0101

 

Feedback

Public engagement on the design and integration of the public space surrounding the station is open now and running from 6 October to 3 November 2021.