Commercial Bay facts for kids
Commercial Bay was once a real bay, or a curve in the coastline, located on the southern side of the Waitematā Harbour in Auckland, New Zealand. It was the original edge of the Auckland waterfront.
This bay was surrounded by two large pieces of land that stuck out into the water, called headlands. To the west was Smale's Point, and to the east was Point Britomart. A stream called the Waihorotiu Stream flowed down a valley and into the bay.
The bay was named "Commercial Bay" because it was planned to be the main business area for the new city of Auckland. This was different from "Official Bay," where government workers first lived.
Over time, Queen Street was built along the valley where the Waihorotiu Stream flowed. Eventually, the stream was covered up. The headlands on both sides of the bay were dug away between the 1860s and 1920s. Their stone was used to fill in parts of the sea, creating new land for Auckland to grow. This also helped build a new waterfront with large docks. Today, tall buildings stand where the bay and its headlands once were.
How Commercial Bay Changed Over Time
Commercial Bay has a fascinating history of how it transformed. It's where an important person named Logan Campbell set up his tent in 1840. He had just heard that Auckland was going to become the capital city of the colony.
In 1853, a writer named William Swainson described Auckland from the harbour. He said the city looked best from the water. He noted that many houses were built near the water, in the bays and on the headlands. These bays had small valleys behind them that led inland.
Building New Land
Changes to Commercial Bay started early. By 1859, a new seawall was built. This wall stretched from Fort Street to the new Customs Street East. This created a straight edge for the first 9 acres (about 36,000 square meters) of new land, which was filled in behind the wall. This made the coastline straight instead of curved.
Around this time, Smale's Point was already being dug up. Its stone was used as fill, and removing it also made it easier to get to Freemans Bay. Later, in the 1870s and 1880s, Point Britomart was also quarried. Its stone helped fill in land for Mechanics Bay.
By 1955, a huge amount of land, about 1.6 square kilometers, had been filled in. Because of all this new land, Commercial Bay no longer looked like a bay at all. It had become part of the city's expanded land area.
