Paekākāriki is also served by the nearby Transmission Gully and Kāpiti Expressway (both part of State Highway 1).

[4] Though usually written in English without macrons, the New Zealand Geographic Board changed the official name to Paekākāriki on 21 June 2019.

[10] During the 1820s the war leader Te Rauparaha defeated and expelled the earlier inhabitants and claimed the region for Ngāti Toa and their allies.

[10] Te Rauparaha, whose pa was on nearby Kapiti Island, died in 1849, the same year that a road connecting Paekākāriki with Porirua was completed.

In 1917, NZR withdrew dining cars from its passenger trains due to World War I economic difficulties and Paekākāriki became a main refreshment stop on the trip north; originally a temporary measure, the dining cars did not return for decades and Paekākāriki's status remained until the 1960s.

The locomotive depot gradually declined in importance due to changing motive power, and nowadays only FP/FT "Matangi" class electric multiple units are stabled here.

Paekākāriki's steep surrounding hills proved suitable terrain for marching and mortar practice, whilst its beaches were used to stage amphibian invasions.

They were the scene of an unfortunate tragedy in June 1943 when a landing craft was swamped by a wave during a nighttime training exercise.

Nine men drowned in the heavy surf according to official figures; local rumour put the toll higher.

Tarawa Street, for example, commemorates one of the bloodiest battles of the Pacific War which locally based marines fought in directly after the camps were abandoned in October 1943.