Happy New Year 2025 to you all! And what a great year it is going to be with Te Rimutahi due for completion in May this year.
The Community-Led Design Group is delighted and extremely grateful to mana whenua who have generously gifted the name Te Rimutahi. The Waitematā Local Board formally received this taonga at their business meeting on 10 December 2024. We thank mana whenua and acknowledge their tāria te wā and kaitiakitanga (long-term thinking and guardianship) of the project. Ngā mihi nui.
Cassidy Construction’s team restarted work on-site in early January. Under the retained canopy roof, foundations are being installed to lay the wooden floor within the precast concrete edges that are already in place. This space will become the Urban Canopy and it will provide an all-weather area for markets, performances, events, and so on. Universal access has been included in the design of this raised area, with a precast concrete 1:12 accessible ramp leading up from Ponsonby Road. All the spaces of Te Rimutahi have been designed to be accessible.
The steelwork of the Green Discovery Room, the Pergola structure (parallel to the Dizengoff Cafe wall), and the wall itself are being painted and the tiles laid. The Pergola will have a long timber bench seat fixed to the structure with planter boxes behind. The selected plants in these planters, with the support of steel lattice wires, will green and soften the perimeter wall.
The steel planters are in place and the precast linear bleacher seats and retaining garden levels, are now mostly all in situ with the Green Room area at the (western) rear of the site, formed. Te Rimutahi is taking shape with a generous layout and enough space to accommodate multiple activities, concurrently.
Bravo! At the time of writing the roadworks and street improvements, to ensure accessing Te Rimutahi is safe and easy, are planned to take place from Monday 20 January.
Stage 1 (Southern side) 20 Jan – 10 Feb
Stage 2 (Northern side) 17 Feb – 24 March.
This work involves the construction of a raised pedestrian crossing and the Ponsonby Road pavement improvement work.
So get excited!
This previously unloved and dilapidated site is being transformed into a beautiful and multi-functional civic space. Te Rimutahi will be the common ground that enables everyone to come together to rest, relax and recreate. A place to meet new people or catch up with old friends, to enjoy some of the many activities, exhibitions & markets that the space will be able to host. These are the very things that build and nurture community, and it is why Te Rimutahi is exactly the infrastructure and amenity the community has reliably and consistently shown that they want and need here. The development of Te Rimutahi will create a new focus for the neighbourhood and will be an attractor to the Ponsonby area, which will support our local businesses.
Te Rimutahi will be an urban oasis that will be good for the people, good for the environment, and good for Tāmaki Makaurau.
Future generations will enjoy the shade of the trees we are planting here.
Bring it on!
For more information or to contact the Community-Led Design Group, please see our website: 254ponsonbyrd.org.nz or our Facebook pages; Ponsonby Park, or 254 Ponsonby Road.
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1 comment
Well done everyone involved. This is a much needed community space.