ACTIVATION

Concept image of the NCC Electricity Building brought back into use, with steps down to the water beside it
The NCC Electricity Building brought back into use, with steps down to the water beside it. Draft Masterplan, Irving Smith Architects. Concept picture, not a final design.

It is really three buildings: a 1922 block, a 1937 block reaching out over the water, and a 1976 addition. It is listed as a Category B heritage building, and it still does a job – an electrical substation inside it feeds power through to the Port, and would stay.

It also carries the Aotearoa mural, which is well known and much liked. The Masterplan is clear that the mural stays.

Right now the building is the reason you cannot walk the waterfront. It sits across the route, and the wharf beside it has rotted to the point where it is not safe to walk on. In Stage 1 a new structure carries the path around it. Later, in Stage 3, the building could be brought back into use – and it sits directly above the steps into the sea from Question 3, so the building and the water access would be built together.

What would go in it

Stage 3 · $12.0m

The 1922 block could house public toilets, changing rooms and showers at ground level, beside the substation and under the mural. Above, office or commercial space – possibly for the Harbour Master or Coastguard, or a marine business.

The 1937 block, which stands over the water, would be reduced back to dry land. Its heritage roof shape stays, sheltering a new covered public space open to everyone, with a café or hospitality tenancy at the southern end and a mezzanine above.

About 150m² per level in the 1922 part and 170m² per level in the 1937 part could be leased.

This is where your answer to Question 5 lands. What you told us you want on the waterfront – a café, a market, somewhere to hire a kayak.

Why it costs what it does

The largest item in the plan

Two buildings, both needing strengthening, new services and a new roof – and all of it on the water's edge. The figure also covers the former wharf area beside it. It is a Stage 3 cost; the Stage 1 pathway work around it is counted separately.

We want your guidance

Is $12.0m the right level of investment in this building? Should we do more, less, or about this much?

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