[3]: Fig.6 Basement is the mudstones and sandstones of the Miocene Waitemata Group East Coast Bays Formation.

[3]: 352  The reason that the lake is larger than the original maar is believed to be because the inner tephra ring deposits may have slumped into the crater.

[5]: 338  The tuff ring is generally stable except for the north-east side mainly on the northern bank of the Pourewa Stream.

[6] An accurate chronology exists over the last glacial cycle between about 9500 and 130,000 BP as a result of two cores taken of lake sediment in 2016.

[7][8]: 191–192  Tephra studies, including compositional analysis, have defined the major recent Taupō Volcanic Zone eruptions where ash reached Auckland (see timeline on this page which also shows changes in type of lake, its oxygenation and climate with more detail in references).

The railway runs along a causeway embankment which was constructed in the 1920s and created a barrier between the Ōrākei Basin and the rest of the Waitematā Harbour.