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The Auckland Metropolitan Area, or Greater Auckland, in the North Island of New Zealand, is the largest urban area in New Zealand. With over 1.2 million people it has almost a third of the country's population. It is a conurbation, made up of Auckland City ... more »
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Airports The Auckland Metropolitan Area, or Greater Auckland, in the North Island of New Zealand, is the largest urban area in New Zealand. With over 1.2 million people it has almost a third of the country's population.
It is a conurbation, made up of Auckland City (excluding the Hauraki Gulf islands), North Shore City, and the urban parts of Waitakere and Manukau cities, along with Papakura District and some nearby urban parts of Rodney and Franklin Districts. In Maori it bears the traditional name Tamaki Makau Rau or the transcribed version of Auckland, Akarana.
Auckland lies between the Hauraki Gulf of the Pacific Ocean to the east, the low Hunua Ranges to the south-east, the Manukau Harbour to the south-west, and the Waitakere Ranges and smaller ranges to the west and north-west. The central part of the urban area occupies a narrow isthmus between the Manukau Harbour on the Tasman Sea and the Waitemata Harbour on the Pacific Ocean. It is one of the few cities in the world to have harbours on two separate bodies of water.
Attractive aspects of Auckland life are its mild climate, plentiful employment and educational opportunities, and numerous leisure facilities.
Auckland is popularly known as the "City of Sails" because the harbour is often dotted with hundreds of yachts and has more per capita than any other city in the world. Viaduct Basin hosted two America's Cup challenges, and its cafes, restaurants, and clubs add to Auckland's vibrant nightlife.
High Street, Queen Street, Ponsonby Road, and Karangahape Road are also very popular with urban socialites. Newmarket and Parnell are upmarket shopping centres. Otara's and Avondale's famous fleamarkets and Victoria Park Market are a colourful alternative shopping experience.
Things to do
* Aotea Square, and Queen Street - the hub of downtown Auckland, often the site of crafts markets, rallies or arts festivals. * Botany Town Centre, Howick - a complete shopping complex, one of the largest in Auckland includes a cinema, bowling alley, food court and many shops to visit. * Britomart Transport Centre - the downtown train and bus centre housed in a historical building. * Eden Park - the city's primary stadium and a frequent home for All Blacks rugby and Black Caps cricket matches. * Harbour Bridge - connecting Auckland and the North Shore is an iconic symbol of Auckland. * Karangahape Road - known as K' Road, a street in upper central Auckland, famous for its bars, clubs and smaller shops. * Kelly Tarlton's Underwater World - a well-known Auckland aquarium in the eastern Mission Bay suburb, built in a set of former sewage storage tanks, and showing fish like Sharks. * MOTAT - Aucklands Museum for Transport and Technology, with its main site at Western Springs. * Mount Eden - a volcanic cone with a grassy crater, it offers a nice view of Auckland and the surrounding area, being the highest point in Auckland and a famous tourist destination. * Mt Smart Stadium - a stadium used mainly for rugby league and soccer matches. Also used for concerts. * Mount Victoria, although slightly out-of-the-way for the casual tourist, offers a spectacular view of the city. A brisk walk from the Devonport Ferry terminal, the cone is steeped in history as is the nearby North Head. * One Tree Hill (Maungakiekie) - a volcanic cone which dominates the skyline in the southern, inner suburbs. It no longer has a tree on the summit, instead being crowned by an obelisk. * Ponsonby Road - a road (and suburb) west of central Auckland known for arts, cafes and culture. * Rangitoto Island - guards the entrance to Waitemata Harbour, and forms a prominent feature on the eastern horizon. * Sky Tower - the tallest free-standing structure in the Southern Hemisphere, stands 328 m tall. * Sylvia Park - a shopping complex in Mount Wellington opened in June 2006. Once completed it will become one of the largest malls in the southern hemisphere. It contains the largest Warehouse store in New Zealand. * Viaduct Basin - a marina in downtown Auckland, venue for the America's Cup regatta 2000 and 2003. It is now a thriving commercial centre and has many new upscale residential buildings. * Western Springs Stadium - a natural amphitheatre used mainly for speedway races, rock and pop concerts.
Birth of Auckland After the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi in February 1840 the new Governor of New Zealand, William Hobson, had the task of choosing a capital for the colony. At the time, the main European settlements were in the Bay of Islands. However, the Bay of Islands' geographical position made it very remote, inaccessible and off-centre from the rest of the New Zealand archipelago.
Even in 1840 Port Nicholson (now Wellington Harbour) seemed the obvious choice for an administrative capital. Centrally situated at the south of the North Island, close to the South Island and growing fast, it had a lot to commend it. But the New Zealand Company and the Wakefield brothers had founded and continued to dominate Port Nicholson. Furthermore, it already had a bad reputation with the Maori for unscrupulous or even illegal occupation of land.
Twentieth century While trams and railway lines shaped Aucklands rapid extension in the early first half of the 20th century, they were soon overtaken by motor vehicles, with Auckland boasting one of the highest car-ownership rates of the world even before WW II. Their growing popularity meant that urban development was freed from narrow corridors, and could occur anywhere new roads were built, leading to a rapid decentralisation, with urban growth spreading all over the Isthmus. In 1959 the new Auckland Harbour Bridge linked North Shore with the city, further extending its reach.
In World War II the city was overflown by a Japanese seaplane, chased ineffectually by a Royal New Zealand Air Force De Havilland Tiger Moth. Again, coastal fortifications were built or extended, with a large military base on Rangitoto storing mines supposed to block the inner Hauraki Gulf in the event of an impending Japanese invasion, which in the end never came to pass.
Following the initiative of Michael Joseph Savage's New Zealand Labour Party large numbers of state houses were constructed through the late 1930s, '40s and '50s, usually on quarter-acre (1,000 m²) sections - a tradition that survives despite frequent subdivision. To this day, a large percentage of the houses in Auckland only have one full story. Due to these factors, Auckland is a largely suburban, low-density city: although it has not much more than a seventh of the population of London, it sprawls over a considerably larger area - a fact that serves to make public transport by Auckland's rail and bus systems unpopular and uneconomic.
All four electrical power cables supplying the Central Business District failed on 20 February 1998, causing the 1998 Auckland power crisis. It took five weeks before an emergency overhead cable was completed to restore the power supply to the Central Business District. For much of that time, about 60,000 of the 74,000 people who worked in the area worked from home or from relocated offices in the suburbs. Many of the 6,000 apartment dwellers in the area had to find alternative accommodation. Mercury Energy, operators of the cable that failed, had to spend many millions of dollars on the temporary cable, and compensation for local businesses.
The 2006 Auckland Blackout showcased the fact that Aucklands power-supply infrastructure is still very vulnerable to disruption. A faulty powerline shackle caused a short-circuit at the Otahuhu substation, with the blackout affecting wide parts of the conurbation, including the CBD, but sparing most of Waitakere City and North Shore City. While the blackout lasted only about half a day, it reignited political pressure aiming to improve the national electricity grid.
* Auckland has a warm-temperate climate, with warm, humid summers and mild, damp winters. January temperatures average 21-24 °C. February can be warmer than January, but temperatures rarely exceed 30 °C July maximum temperatures average 14-16 °C. High levels of rainfall occur almost year-round (over 1100 mm per year), especially in winter. Climatic conditions vary in different parts of the city owing to geography such as hills, land cover and distance from the sea. On 27 July 1939 Auckland received its only recorded snow fall. This is unlike some South Island cities, which may get snow most years - Christchurch regularly gets snow down to sea level.
Temperature - Yearly Average
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Distances are calculated as the crow flies, and are provided as an aid in planning only.
* This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.
It uses material from the Source wikipedia.
