News & Media Releases

Grand Old Lady Lifts Her Skirts

23 September 2005

Number 13 Tonks Avenue, the grand home of Victorian entrepreneur Kate Tonks, is being lifted up and moved to make room for the new Wellington Inner City Bypass. It will move early next week from Old Tonks Avenue to its new location at the head of the newly created Kensington Precinct.

Built in 1906 for Kate Tonks in the Edwardian Queen Anne style, the house was home to the Stagecraft Theatre for 40 years.

Transit project manager Jonnette Adams said 13 Tonks Avenue will join other heritage properties also relocated recently to the Kensington Precinct.

"The Precinct comprises of the original 12 and 14 Tonks Avenue, 21 Kensington Street, 270 Cuba Street and now 13 Tonks Avenue," she says.

Restoration works will include the reinstatement of the ground floor verandah, a new front door with coloured sidelights in keeping with the original style, and replacement of the windows to their original positions.

Ms Adams said that this building is one of the most spectacular buildings being relocated as part of the project.

"To see this particular building restored to its former elegance will be extremely rewarding to both Transit and the Te Aro community," she said.

The historical component has been a very significant part of the Inner City Bypass project in order to preserve the heritage of Te Aro for future generations. Eighteen heritage buildings are being relocated and restored as part of the project.

For further information please contact:

Jonnette Adams
Project manager
Transit New Zealand
DDI: 04 801 2598
Email: jonnette.adams@transit.govt.nz

Rebecca Collerton
Communications advisor
Transit New Zealand
DDI: 04 801 2521
Email: Rebecca.collerton@transit.govt.nz


Background notes

History of Number 13 Tonks Avenue

Named as Wharanui, this house was built for Kate Tonks, a successful Wellington property owner, in 1906.

She was originally Kate Heyler until she married Henry Tonks, a coal and wood merchant and Maori interpreter.

Henry died at the age of 40, in 1984 leaving her to bring up five children. Kate subsequently constructed at least four buildings in what was then called Tonks Grove and owned other buildings within the city and in Karori.

Kate lived in Wharanui with her spinster sister and later took in boarders.

Number 13 is a two-storeyed house designed in the Edwardian Queen Anne style and is constructed of a timber frame with rusticated weatherboard and intricate detailing.

Following her death in 1937, Wharanui was retained in Kate s family but was sold to Wellington City Council in the 1950s, subsequently becoming the home of Stagecraft Theatre from 1962 2002.

About the Wellington Inner City Bypass

The Wellington Inner City Bypass will provide a safer, more efficient route between the southern and eastern suburbs and the northern gateway to Wellington. It will re-route cross-city traffic away from Ghuznee Street and the heart of the inner city and Cuba Street area.

It is a one-way, two-lane road at ground level, with dedicated turning lanes and a 50km/h speed limit (until just past the Willis Street intersection, heading north, where the speed limit will increase to 80km/h and the road will be gradually lowered beneath Vivian Street). Existing roads will be altered and redefined, and 700 metres of new road will be constructed along with 1080 metres of new footpath and cycleway.

A total of 23 heritage buildings are to be preserved as part of the project at an estimated cost of $3million. Of these, five will remain in place and 18 relocated and restored, with one taken down and reconstructed using materials still in good condition.

Buildings of similar age and style will be kept together, preserved and restored with their original orientation and access maintained wherever possible. A historic precinct will be created adjoining Footscray Avenue for those we have to move.

Transit will install three new sets of traffic signals, build a new motorway on-ramp at Willis/Abel Smith Streets and move the current motorway off-ramp from Ghuznee Street to Vivian Street. A new link between Cuba Street and Willis Street will also be created.

Wellington City Council s Te Aro Stormwater main will start at the Taranaki St end of Arthur St, progress along the northern side of Arthur St, across Cuba St and along the route of the bypass until Willis Street, where the main will be laid up Palmer Street to Te Aro Park.

Construction of the bypass is expected to be completed mid 2007.

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