Wellington is fine, actually.
Look, I know it’s popular to rag on the city you live in — or at least that’s what I’ve been led to believe by x amount of journalists and editors New Zealand-wide of late, whose consistent, nascent pieces of journalism seem determined to paint Wellington with the “dying city” brush.
Yesterday marked what feels like the thousandth article about how Wellington is “dying”, “isn’t what it was”, “going down the drain”, “only fit for the zombies in 2007’s excellent film Resident Evil: Extinction” and the like, and frankly — I’m tired of it!
I get it. It’s easy to rag on Wellington.
Our city plan was designed by a guy who maybe hadn’t even been here, our pipes get blocked more than they should, and it rains often. There’s more empty shops along one specific part of Courtenay Place than there are full ones, and Readings Cinema, the Amora Hotel and the Gordon Wilson Flats have been sitting empty for an embarrassingly long time.
I get it.
I’ve been told time and time again that Wellington was better back in the day, at some indeterminate point in the early 2000s where prosperity was ubiquitous, Wellington’s streets were shining and apparently no-one at all lived in poverty or dismay. Every op-ed pulls out ol’ Sir John Key’s quote from 2013, where he told an Auckland audience that Wellington was, “dying”.
The media nous on the topic is consistently very, very grim, spouting that things won’t get better, can’t get better, that Wellington’s time in the sun is over.
That the liquidation of Wishbone — a well-known coffee and snacks chain — marks the end of the world.
With the decline of such a bastion of cultural capital I guess we should all just squirrel away into the Aro Ditch and die then.
Fuck that noise.
Oh, to be an op-ed writer, pining for the slow slide into oblivion without further interrogating how we got to this place. None of these opinion pieces will ever talk about how landlords hiking commercial rent pushes away those smaller businesses who can’t afford heightened occupancy charges; nor will they question the Opposition and certain local retailers’ consistent whining about Let’s Get Wellington Moving — a program that is set to improve pedestrian access to the Golden Mile — that is, if local business owners, council members and an Opposition with a fetish for cars ever let it get off the ground.
(National’s apparently going to scrap the entire thing if they get in in October, despite it being a policy that Wellingtonians overwhelmingly voted for! Joy! Better things aren’t possible, apparently.)
None of these op-ed writers ever seem to find the numbers, which show that public transport usage across the entire Metlink network is back to 90% of pre-COVID levels, suggesting that central Wellington is not the apocalyptic wasteland that they imply it to be.
None of these op-ed writers talk about how worldwide there has been a move towards supporting suburbs, as opposed to central city hubs.
None of these op-ed writers ever consider the cultural growth the city has seen of late; the opening of Tākina, the overwhelming success of the FIFA Women’s World Cup, of Beervana, of Wellington on a Plate, of the RNZB, Wicked, Les Mis, Homegrown, several huge artists visiting our shores, the Comedy Fest, the NZ International Film Festival, alongside smaller but no less important sold out seasons across venues like BATS, Circa Theatre and the Opera House.
All there is is doom and gloom — if you’re willing to only look for that.
Wellington does feel dire at times. I wish there were better mid-sized venues. I wish I wasn’t paying $500+ fortnightly to live in an apartment with three other people. I wish food was cheaper, public transport was more frequent and I could go two weeks in winter without getting a cold. I wish there were better, cleaner apartments and that something had been done about Readings/Gordon Wilson/Amora instead of them sitting empty for 5+ years.
But sitting on your ass opining for a past that didn’t exist isn’t the answer.
I’m twenty-six. I’ve been living in this city on and off for nine years. During that time I’ve seen it ebb and flow, build and grow. I’ve seen buildings be torn down from earthquake damage, and better things be built in their place.
I’ve seen things change, but I’ve not seen things decline, unless declination is borne on the amount of times I can go to different Burger Kings in the Wellington Region in one day (only seven times!).
Complaining that we’re a dying city because Wishbone, an overpriced chain with average food, has gone into liquidation isn’t helping. Whining that better things aren’t possible is exhausting when you’re actively not helping them improve.
If you want stagnation, keep on being an opposition to progress.
I live in the Cuba Quarter, and it is a beating heart unlike any other. It’s never quiet, it’s never still, and all you hear is the humanity around you. Though it would be better with a series of moderate to high rise affordable apartments, wider pavements, and better facilitation of social services, moving to the central city is never something I’ve regretted.
Op-ed writers, I encourage you — explore the city you claim to love. Wander the Cuba Quarter. Visit Eva Street and Leeds Street. See a show. Push through the crowds on the city streets at night. Visit Willis Lane, or any of the restaurants tucked away just off the Golden Mile, out of view. Get lunch from a food truck on the waterfront. Travel to the suburbs, and understand what they have to offer.
The city’s not dead, you’re just an office worker sitting in Midland Park at 8am on a rainy day on a Thursday. You’ve got to look further afield.
Strive for improvements and change — instead of sitting up in a cloud of NIMBYism and whining that nothing’s getting better — cause you and no-one you know are making strides to improve it or engage with it.
Otherwise, maybe we should all just give up now.
