Wynyard Quarter

As one of the first changes, the eastern section of the Quarter, as well as one of the main west-east roads running across it, were revitalised with new office and entertainment/restaurant areas, with several major projects finishing in time for the 2011 Rugby World Cup tournament.

The last components of the reclamation (Wynyard Wharf) were being completed in 1930 and provided the growing harbour with additional berthage capacity and increased land for port activities.

[2] SeaLink runs a car and passenger ferry service to Great Barrier Island from a terminal at the base of Wynyard Wharf.

The company was seeking clarification of its future facilities in the area in 2007, as their lease was running out in 2010, and it was unlikely to invest a planned NZ$19 million in a new terminal or start using a new, faster ferry vessel before legal concerns were sorted out.

The vessel serves Ports of Auckland shipping by bringing in fuels from the Marsden Point refinery in Whangārei.

[4] A sand mining company, McCallum Brothers, used part of the western water's edge to unload barges of dredged sand (for construction projects) but has moved out of the area which was subsequently transformed into a public park / event space (Silo Park).

One of the main public inputs at that time was a wish for increased waterfront access, as well as the desire for more parkland on the point.

This has now been replaced with 'Wynyard Quarter', though it is still generally referred to as Tank Farm, including when talking about the whole Western Reclamation.

[7] Others have suggested the label 'Tech-Farm', referencing a 2004 call to showcase on the waterfront New Zealand's best sustainable design and technology,[8] as well as anticipating the government's and council's 2012 initiative to establish an 'innovation precinct' within the Wynyard Quarter.

The layout of the park is also to be decided via an international design competition, and would leave space for a so far unidentified landmark public building.

After 10–16-storey buildings proposed in 2006 met strong opposition, the July 2007 design envisages only a small number of 14-storey towers, with the main apartment strips along the eastern side of Wynyard Wharf being no higher than seven storeys at the road, stepping down to three storeys at the water's edge.

A major negative point for this usage would however be the short-term (from 2010 on) need for more cruise ship space, while the tank farm is unlikely to be redeveloped less than a decade in the future.

All the projects are to be completed in time for the Rugby World Cup 2011, when the area is to be part of an extended Viaduct Basin visitor zone on the waterfront.

[18] Such a link, initially to the Britomart Transport Centre was originally intended to form part of the initial works, but the global financial crisis scuttled plans to make the new Wynyard Crossing substantial enough to also serve trams, though the foundations for the interim bridge will be sufficient for a later bridge upgrade.

[11] A less likely option has also been proposed by Mike Lee, Auckland Regional Council chairman, who suggested a tunnel underneath the Auckland CBD to emerge east of the city centre at Stanley Street, thus avoiding the Central Motorway Junction and city centre traffic.

However, as it was unlikely that the harbour tunnel section would be built before 2020 at the earliest, coordination with the development of the new quarter would pose some difficulties.

[11][27] The Air New Zealand head office is located off of Beaumont and Fanshawe Streets in Western Reclamation Precinct 2.