Loss of built heritage – sometimes we care, sometimes we don’t

Island Bay will continue to mourn the loss of Erskine College, so long a dominating part of our built environment.

But as the wreckers were wrecking that fine landmark and even older and even more dominant part of our built environment was lost. And no one noticed, let alone protested or campaigned. No one wrote to the newspapers or to Heritage New Zealand. Councillors were not disturbed by late night calls from irate Bayites who treasured our heritage and had been mourning their loss over a glass of red. 

No, the overhead tramlines that dominated The Parade were gone in an instant, with not a word of protest and quite a few words of relief as the sky came into view without the black lines cutting across it. 

The wires themselves had led to the demise of another part of our history, so historic there are now none who remember them: the horse trams