Public Interest and Queens Wharf

Just wanted to show what Auckland Council is allowing, incrementally, on Queens Wharf. Right now. I took this picture from the end of Queens Wharf looking out to the Harbour entrance. You can see Mt Victoria and North Head to the left. A signature view from Auckland's public waterfront. I took the picture about a year ago.

This image is from a blog I posted a couple of months ago, showing how that view would change, if Ports of Auckland expansion plans went ahead.

This photo-shopped image shows how that view could change after the reclamation. In fact it is likely to be even worse because Ports want to stack containers high on their newly reclaimed land to cope with an almost quadrupling of container volumes.

But sadly, that view has already changed. I took this photo today. This incredibly ugly and threatening fence has gone up. A sign of things to come on Queens Wharf. Which is already turning into a taxi rank and car park for all and sundry. I appreciate there are gates in this fence which are usually open when there is not a cruise ship there. But the fence is a hundred metres long. Ugly and threatening.

This fence is presumably needed when a cruise ship visits. A far cry from the striking red fence that kept the public away from the port in days gone by. There are so many other more creative ways to temporarily protect the cruise ship industry from the attention of Auckland's public. Given that the majority of days the whole wharf is available to the public, surely it is in the public interest NOT to have a permanent fence like this. One leader described Queens Wharf as Auckland's next Regional Park. Do we really need permanent fences like this in public places?