in wartime style

Local resident and World War II veteran Ron Child dressed as a wartime despatch rider as part of a colourful celebration of his recent 100th birthday.

He was given a tiki tour of Devonport in a classic-car cavalcade, chauffeured by local RSA members Michael Grieg and George McGregor, and welcomed to the RSA in Victoria Rd to the sound of bagpipes played by Joe McCallum.

After ascending the stairs, his arrival inside was announced by Chris Mullane: “Ladies and gentlemen, a despatch rider has arrived from the front! Please welcome Leading Aircraftman Despatch Rider Ron Child, previously Bombardier Ron Child of the New Zealand Artillery!”

Continuing proceedings, RSA President Muzz Kennett gave the assembled family, friends and RSA members a detailed recount of Child’s military service. He initially served as a bombardier, but after a medical downgrading that prevented him serving overseas, transferred to the Royal New Zealand Air Force, where he became a despatch rider.

Before a cake-cutting, Navy singer Rebecca Nelson sang a Vera Lynn medley in tribute. “It’s such a special achievement,” she says. “We don’t have many of our World War II veterans left, so to see one of them reach 100 is truly amazing.”

Born on 4 May 1921, in Wellington, Child has lived in Devonport for the last nine years, relocating with his wife for a fresh start in 2012, though she sadly died soon after.

He has become an active member of the Devonport RSA, and is much-admired in the community.

“I feel so lucky to know someone with so much character and integrity,” says his neighbour, Christine First.

For his part, the centenarian is thrilled to have reached the milestone. “I started celebrating my birthdays by the decade once I turned 70,” he says. “Then suddenly I was 80, then 90, and now 100. I woke up the next morning and realised, this is the first day of the rest of my life, and the first of a second century!”

He believes keeping a sturdy, forward-moving and positive outlook is the secret to a long life. “Young people today have a tremendous responsibility to pick the right course in life. As long as you keep looking ahead and grasp opportunities as they come, in the face of adversities, you will come out stronger.”

Counting his journey into his second century by the day, Child is “hell-bent” on doing as much as he can to squeeze every drop of joy and passion out of his life.

Time to celebrate... (clockwise from above) Centenarian Ron Child dressed as a wartime despatch rider for his birthday; in a classic Riley driven by Michael Grieg, with piper Joe McCallum in the back seat; and being serenaded by Navy singer Rebecca Nelson

A 400-page book will be published to mark North Shore Rugby Club’s 150th anniversary in 2023.

Journalist and former newspaper editor Jim Eagles is leading a team compiling the book, which will recount club members’ anecdotes and chronicle a social history of Devonport. Eagles is covering 1873 to 1945 and “has unearthed some remarkable stories,” said club chairman Max Webb.

Other club members are researching more recent eras: Webb from post-war to 1979; Murray Scott has the 80s; Laurie Margrain the 90s; Chris Mitchell the 2000s; and Gordon Stuart and Ben Browne 2010 to 2020.

The book will also have chapters on the club’s juniors, president’s grade and All Blacks, with club sponsors Harcourts Cooper & Co supporting its production.

In other developments, Devonport Museum is donating a restored Jim Turkington mural to the club, Webb said. It depicts a North Shore footballer running with ball in hand.

Turkington was known for murals across the country, including one in the former ASB bank in Devonport.

A special jersey will be produced for 2023, “featuring the four colours we’ve played in over the 150 years: red, navy, white and emerald green.” “Along with this there’ll be a wide range of supporters apparel.”

The club’s 150th celebrations will be held over Easter in 2023, with a celebration dinner, casual get-together, formal ball, golf day, church service and farewell breakfast or similar.

“There’ll be a special day to celebrate our junior rugby and matches against Takapuna, possibly Ponsonby (Auckland’s second-oldest club) or a Barbarians-type team,” Webb said.

“We’re arguably the third-oldest club in New Zealand and definitely the oldest in the Auckland region, and we’ve been a consistent

Shore thing... A Jim Turkington mural depicting a North Shore player

part of Devonport’s history. It’ll be a memorable weekend,” Webb said.

The club is wanting local residents to share special memories and photos. “Not just formal team photos. Ideally casual relaxed shots of our members possibly showing the clubrooms and Vauxhall Reserve,” Webb said. He can be contacted at: maxgwebb@ gmail.com

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AGM will be held on 23rd May at 3pm The Guest Speaker will be David Verran.

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The North Shore premier rugby side ran ragged over Takapuna 39-10 in a Friday-night, local-derby thrashing at Onewa Domain last week.

The win leaves the team the only one in the North Harbour competition with seven wins from seven matches, with Shore having clearly put its hand up as the side to beat this season.

It was one of their largest winning margins over Takapuna in years, and the match was played in front of a large crowd under lights.

On paper the sides seemed evenly matched, but Shore brought an intensity seldom seen at club level.

Assistant coach Rua Tupoki has been in charge of defence – and it showed. Shore forced numerous mistakes from punishing tackles and snuffed out any Takapuna breakouts quickly.

Shore scored five tries to one, and after running away to a 21-0 lead after 25 minutes it was never really under threat.

Deep into the second half, Shore players were as committed as they were early on with several urging “let’s take it over 40.”

The win was a real team effort by Shore. Edgar Tu’inukuafe led the side well from the front and lock Adam Batt dominated the line-outs. Second-five James Little was always threatening and scored three tries.

Bryce Shearer at full-back was spot on with his goal- and line-kicking notching four conversions and two penalties.

Jarrod Baker and Connor Hill formed a smart combination at half-back and first-five, with Hill limping off the field with injury in the second half the only real point of concern for Shore.

Experienced prop Alex Woonton is expected to return in the next few weeks adding further impetus to what is turning into a highly cohesive unit. • Shore plays Northcote away on Saturday 22 May.

Injury scare… Shore first-five Connor Hill leaves the field in the second half against Takapuna

Slowdown is good.

It appears the property market is slowing, which is good news for our kids and our country. It was never healthy to have the 20%+ property-price rises we have seen over the last year or so.

We still see underlying demand from low interest rates, but it appears there is not the same FOMO factor and investors are generally taking a wait-and-see approach. Banks are still busy with enquiries and taking up to 10 days for approvals, essentially due to a lack of staff.

There are also a few other factors to watch out for over the next year or so. Inflation is raising its head both here and globally. While central banks may try to look through this, the markets will decide what happens to term rates, and central banks are invariably behind the curve. There is also the prospect of increased residential-property supply (in Auckland especially): the world is opening up for us to travel, a brain and public-sector drain for higher incomes overseas, and a possible return to the workplace for some who fell in love with the lifestyle-block idea but find the reality is a lot of working weekends! So it may not be the one-way traffic we have seen of late.

Speak to us about any finance requirements you may have and our interest-rate outlook – we are happy to help and are available 24/7.

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joined the motorway. “The Navy is doomed,” he said of the Ngataringa Bay side of the naval base.

Coco spoke at a meeting of the Devonport Community Trust, emphasising the risks locally, and showing a visualisation for the peninsula in 2050, during projected highest storm tides.

This shows much of the land between Ngataringa Bay and Narrow Neck cut off by water over the golf course. Windsor Reserve is awash, cutting off the ferry terminal. “The playground will go,” Coco said.

By 2100, the southern end of the peninsula could be “back to being almost an island”.

Coco emphasised that the model – akin to the diorama at Devonport Museum showing unreclaimed swamp in pre-European times – was just that, a scenario of vulnerability, rather than a specific prediction.

But he urged people to realise the worstcase risk was real and needed planning for.

The subject was difficult, but should not be ignored, said the scientist who worked on flood-protection modelling in Venice before moving to New Zealand, first to work at NIWA, then at the university.

The Government, Auckland Council, Navy and regional and local bodies across the country were aware of this, but the issues were complex and the potential costs in dealing with them were vast.

He feared it would take decades, and insurance companies pulling the plug, before significant change was instituted. Generally speaking, options around coastal hazards were to protect, retreat and adapt. “I see a lot of people will just want higher walls.”

Residents at the meeting described the forecasts as “very confronting” and warranting wider communication.

One attendee questioned the wisdom of residential development at Bayswater Marina, and another criticised the loss of permeable land, with sections taken up with concrete pads. Getting an Insurance Council spokesperson to talk to the trust was also suggested.

Devonport-Takapuna Local Board member Trish Deans urged the community to have a say through the process of replacing the Resource Management Act, and by engaging with local environmental groups.

Coco’s research group is compiling data under a MBIE grant, and he was “super keen” to be involved in community initiatives. He said his Devonport modelling did not identify individual property risk, but he got annoyed at the complacency and wrong-headedness of some of the comments he had heard.

Rises in sea levels of 30 to 50cm should be expected, Coco said, “Esmonde Rd will flood more and more.”

Although the outlook for a vulnerable maritime country that built too close to the sea was “very problematic”, Coco said his modelling showed the east coast of the North Island was generally likely to be less heavily inundated than the south and west of the South Island.

Wet, wet, wet... A visualisation of what times of extreme high tides and storms might bring to the Devonport peninsula by 2050, according to coastal-hazards researcher and local resident Dr Giovanni Coco (below)

Bridge-lane rally

The push for a Harbour Bridge bike lane steps up a gear on Sunday 30 May, when riders rally at Pt Erin. With space for bikes under pressure on peak-hour ferries, Bike Auckland says it is lobbying for the future. Its chair Barb Cuthbert, says in the wake of SkyPath stalling it wants a three-month lane trial this summer.

Tree trimming

Tree trimming to clear power lines along the Cheltenham Rd edge of Devonport Domain has begun this week. Plane, puriri, karaka and pohutukawa trees will be trimmed by Auckland Council contractor Treescape. One puriri that has crown dieback will be deadwooded back to growth points.

From page 1

Maungauika: from many perspectives

Art-in-the-round – painter Martin Law’s latest interpretation of his favourite stamping ground, Devonport – is a sculptural exploration of Maungauika. “It’s a huge panoramic view of the summit,” he said while installing the work at the Depot Artspace.

Using a base of kauri scrim boards from a local villa renovation, he has painted panels giving a 360-degree walk-around tour of the maunga. This includes a detailed cross-section of the tunnels and gun emplacements. Vistas span the Hauraki Gulf to Rangitoto and beyond, and across the peninsula to the ferry terminal with the city in the background.

Laws is a regular Depot exhibitor, known for his eye for heritage features and perspective on a landscape that also attracts commissions. In the last exhibition of his ongoing series, Painter of Paradise, he took in village scenes and the view from Takarunga.

This time it was the peninsula’s eastern maunga he explored for fresh angles. The Into and Around the Tihi exhibition, running until 1 June, includes half a dozen other paintings. The largest work shows “the whole system of tunnels,” he says. As well as relying on his own eye, Law researched Devonport Museum archives, and looked at early prints and photographs to better appreciate the maunga layout. He will talk about his work to gallery visitors on Sundays 23 and 30 May.

If the large work in unsold, Laws hopes it might go on display at a Devonport institution, such as the library or the local or Navy museums.

Tunnels exposed... part of Martin Law’s latest large work explores what lies beneath the surface of Maungauika, as well as the surrounding landscape

Hearing and Memory

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By Rob Drent

A mobile Covid vaccination clinic has been launched on the West Coast of the South Island. This could also be a good option for the Devonport peninsula.

Given the problems posed by Lake Rd congestion, and the difficulties some elderly people face in getting to health centres or their GP, a mobile clinic could come to them – and the wider community.

Moving from area to area – Stanley Bay to Cheltenham, Narrow Neck, Belmont, Bayswater and Hauraki – it should be possible to vaccinate the whole peninsula in a few weeks.

From the ‘lack of transparency’ department: When Auckland Transport (AT) decided to can the AT Local ride-share scheme in Devonport at the start of the year, it provided a summary of the reasons behind the decision. Under the Official Information Act, the Flagstaff sought the final reports on which this decision was made, and received a rather opaque response last week.

“The final Auckland Transport Local Review is in the approval stage and it is not yet publicly available. The document will be made publicly available in two to three weeks time and we will email a copy to you as soon as it’s available.”

I found this a bit strange.What does “approval stage” mean? Surely, whatever was put to the AT board and was used as a basis for its decision to discontinue the service could be released immediately?

Or are figures being massaged so the rideshare idea can be viewed in a different light?

From the ‘transparency and good governance department’: A motion to open Devonport-Takapuna Local Board workshops to the public and the media was to be put to the board by its new chair Ruth Jackson, after this issue of the Flagstaff went to press.

It rescinds a previous motion to close the workshops put by former chair Aidan Bennett at the start of the current board term.

The Flagstaff has always supported open workshops. Why? Although, technically, no decisions are made at these workshops, they are often the first time council reports come to light and ideas – good and bad – are thrashed out.

It is also the only chance for the public to see council officers questioned and scrutinised.

Open workshops are at the heart of the local democratic process.

Heritage can be an elusive concept. I recall the hearings into the Masonic apartments more than a decade ago, which revealed the only original part of the old tavern (built in the 1860s) left intact was a piece of toilet wall.

A reader called this week with an interesting observation on the renovation at 110 Victoria Rd.

In a precedent-setting planning decision, the existing cottage will be reduced in size and become the minor dwelling and a larger new build is being constructed at the rear of the section. The reader noted this could actually be viewed as restoring heritage.

It was fashionable in the 1960s and 1970s to extend the lean-to areas at the rear of cottages and villas, to accommodate modern kitchens, bathrooms and laundries. If these were pared back, the cottages in particular would return to a size closer to that of the original building.

A relevant point. But aren’t these lean-tos now heritage in themselves?

It becomes a minefield, in which skilled planners and architects negotiate to achieve their clients’ ends – often larger properties on increasingly expensive sites.

All the more reason for Auckland Council to initiate more precise heritage guidelines – and stick to them.

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Powerless board still split over asset sales

To sell or not to sell? That is the question that continues to divide the Devonport-Takapuna Local Board when it comes to community assets.

A two-way split in the views of the six board members led the new chair, Ruth Jackson, to exercise her first casting vote this month, coming down against sales planned by Auckland Council, in a reversal of the position taken when Aidan Bennett was at the top of the table.

Jackson and her Heart of the Shore ticket, comprising new deputy chair Jan O’Connor and member Trish Deans, now have the balance of power to sway board votes, after the pre-agreed mid-term switch of chairs.

But it’s academic, because the council has the final say and its property division Panuku has already listed Devonport’s former council chambers and Takapuna’s old library building as unwanted assets.

Along with various council reserves in the local-board area, a decision on their sale will be made by mid-year.

Jackson told the Flagstaff she considered it important to ensure opposition to the move to sell 3 Victoria Rd, Devonport and No. 2 The Strand, Takapuna, was recorded.

“We need to let them know where we stand.” But the reality, she accepted, was that it would be “a Panuku and governing-body decision down the line”.

The other reality is that division and lengthy debate on a handful of issues continue to dominate board meetings. This obscures the areas where the board does find common cause.

In terms of its feedback to the council’s 10-year budget plans – which sparked the asset sales vote – most clauses of a lengthy recommendation by Jackson were in the end supported by Bennett, former deputy chair George Wood and by member Toni van Tonder.

Van Tonder proposed several uncarried amendments and, like Bennett, asked for her dissenting vote to be recorded on the clause of Jackson’s substantive motion that opposed selling the two heritage-listed buildings.

Greater tree-protection moves were unanimously urged, with the board asking the council to fund a plan change and to clear a backlog of notable-tree applications, which are not currently being processed.

Board members want a citywide $20 million transport fund, dropped under last year’s Emergency Budget, to be reinstated, so that, locally, a shared walking and cycling connection between Esmonde Rd and Francis St could be progressed. Concern that the renewal of Bayswater ferry terminal was not included in the council’s main long-term plans was also expressed.

The board asked for Wairau estuary work to be specifically named by the council as a beneficiary of spending from its Water Quality Targeted Rate. They further noted that the board’s own efforts to improve water quality were difficult to progress within existing local-board budgets.

Members generally accepted the council’s need to impose a one-off 5 per cent rate rise, accompanied by increased borrowing and ongoing operational savings, so as to maintain council service levels and not jeopardise major projects, including the Lake Rd upgrade.

But it was back to division over whether Auckland Airport and Ports of Auckland shares should be sold to offset council revenue shortfalls.

Jackson denied hers was a blanket opposition to asset sales. She wanted the alternative of airport and port-company share sales to be explored, because even if the council had done so already, this had not been publicly detailed.

“If the chair is suggesting we sell shares and keep assets that are a noose around our necks, I’m not sure it’s a good idea,” said Bennett.

Van Tonder said the shares had in pre-Covid times returned regular dividends to the council, helping keep rates rises in check. Selling them would be short-sighted. Keeping deteriorating assets made no sense. “Get rid of them, release the funds and do something meaningful for our community.”

Outside the meeting, Jackson reiterated her view to the Flagstaff that the former Devonport Borough Council chambers should be saved for community use or leased to commercial interests willing to do them up. Bennett said it would be better to sell them to a business to upgrade.

Talk of the building being an earthquake risk was largely a red herring, Jackson claimed, given it had not been red- or yellow-carded, just left empty to deteriorate with 35-year notices of the need to upgrade.

In the case of No. 2 The Strand, the council could use it, rather than lease office space over the road, she said.

Casting vote... New chair Ruth Jackson voted against asset sales

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In the pink for a good cause

Coming up roses... (from left) Wayne Bulog, Sue Stanaway and event organiser Lynda Betts

Enjoying the annual fundraising breakfast... Ruth Combes (above) and Kate Dobbin (left) and Morag Fryer at right

Almost 50 people turned out for the annual Devonport Pink Ribbon Breakfast held at Correlli’s last week, raising $1400 for the Breast Cancer Foundation.

Event organiser Lynda Betts, who was diagnosed with breast cancer 13 years ago and recovered after treatment, said: “Everyone enjoyed the morning and the silent auction of items kindly donated by local businesses also went well.”

The Pink Ribbon Street Appeal this year is on 29 and 30 October.

The hats have it… (from left) Helen Michell, Gale Wieland and Beth Hansen. Below: Prue de Bie (left) and Diana Clement with daughter Maia Brown

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