Hi there
I was walking through Wellington's city centre (CBD) last week and I was stunned by how different from just a few years ago the shops are in Manners Street and Courtenay Place. Dozens have closed down. The ones that are hanging on are shabby, tacky, slummy. They're ghost shops.
And yet the Wellington City Council have seen fit to rebuild a little toilet block on the corner of Courtenay Place and Taranaki Street. The price: two million dollars. Two million dollars for a few toilets? Wouldn't that money have been better spent polishing up the area? Oh, wait, much of that two million dollar price tag includes some sort of expensive digital night-time lighting display on the outside walls of the structure. I guess that's all right then...
above: Herald newspaper photo.... the toilets, all lit up.
As the top-named emporiums have moved out (Kiwibank, how patriotic of you?), a different sort of shop keeper has moved in. Ones that sell healing crystals and incense. Or insurance. Or spa treatments and manicures. And there are lots of mobile repair shops, and hole in the wall coffee and sushi places. And $2 Shops that have now had to drop that name because their products are quadruple the old $2 price tag.
In Auckland there are now dozens of little kiosks run by young entrepreneurs who are selling dresses for size 2 ladies. And chic raincoats for pet poodles. And faux jewellery by the window-full. Auckland's Smith and Caughey Department Store has closed, as has Wellington's David Jones, and Farmers in Cuba Mall.
Cross fingers please that Courtenay Place and Manners Street will be able to revert back to being streets for Wellingtonians to be proud of.
above: Lambton Quay, July 2025. This area has not, as yet, been breached by empty shops. But how about empty streets?
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