Tawa is the northernmost suburb within the Wellington city boundary, located roughly 15 km north of Wellington's CBD between Churton Park and Porirua in the North Island of New Zealand. It takes its name from the broadleaf tree, which was once prolific throughout the area, although its most famous tree is the Bucket Tree, a large macrocarpa with the topiary of an upside-down bucket. Tawa is also known for its large number of churches, representing a wide range of Christian denominations.
Within Tawa, there are a number of named subdivisions: Lindenvale, Westhaven, Redwood and Southgate to the west and Linden, Greenacres and Sundale to the east of the central Tawa area.
Toponymy
Before 1959, Tawa was known as Tawa Flat, thought to be a reference to the Tawa trees that grew there and the flat and arable floor of the valley as it widened out in the Tawa area. The first known use of the name "Tawa Flat" was by John Woodman who used it as his address in the electoral roll for the Wellington Country District, published in the Wellington Provincial Gazette of 28 August 1854. As others living in the area gave their address in the 1854 roll as "Porirua Road", it is possible that John Woodman was the originator of the name.
Starting at the time of the Tawa Flat School and Tawa Flat District Centennial in 1955, there was a popular move to change the name of the "Borough of Tawa Flat" to the "Borough of Tawa" as more people now lived in the hilly areas on the sides of the valley or in Linden and only a minority lived in the area previously known as Tawa Flat. The New Zealand Geographic Board decided on 24 November 1958 "that on and after the 23rd of February 1959 the name of the Borough of Tawa Flat shall be Borough of Tawa." From 1959, the area became known as Tawa and usage of Tawa Flat has been discontinued.Tawa Heritage, Wellington City Libraries. Retrieved 22 August 2016A little about the Tawa Borough Council, tawalink.com. Retrieved 22 August 2016
History Early history The iwi with mana whenua in Tawa are Ngāti Toa Rangatira and Taranaki Whānui. Ngāti Toa Rangatira have had parcels of land in Tawa and Linden returned to them as part of a housing partnership with the Crown.
Though Māori people had not previously settled in the Tawa valley, they would have passed through it when travelling between the centuries-old established populations at Porirua and Te Whanganui a Tara. A Māori track, later developed in the 1840s for the Old Porirua Road, ran between the two harbours, while another such track ran from Willowbank to the Horokiwi Ridge and Petone.
As with the rest of Wellington, Tawa was colonised by the New Zealand Company in the mid-19th century under the direction of Edward Gibbon Wakefield. The Company claimed to have purchased the land from local Māori - this claim "did not take into account of Maori existing land use, and was further undermined by the New Zealand Company and later by the government." It was divided into 100-acre blocks, providing some of the 100-acre "in the country" blocks that accompanied the one-acre "in town" (i.e., central Wellington) blocks, similar to other Company settlements. Much of the eastern side of the Tawa valley came to be owned by a single family until the demand for housing land overtook the benefits of farming the land. In 1951, a Town District was established covering Tawa and Linden. Within two years this had become Tawa Flat Borough.
Development The development of Tawa, like many population centres, has been strongly tied to the development of transportation networks. It was initially a rural settlement established along the Old Porirua Road. During construction of the road in 1846-47, the road-making soldiers used two stockades, built a kilometre apart from each other, to sleep in and for protection from potential attacks. The initial settlers had to clear the surrounding heavy forests before they could begin building and farming on the land.
In 1851 the first church opened, and in 1855 the first school opened, but Tawa remained predominantly rural into the 20th century. While there were early efforts at housing subdivisions, first in 1896 and in 1906 with the establishment of the Tawa Land Company, they failed to attract much interest. Tawa didn't grow significantly until just before World War II, when it began to lose its semi-rural character.
A single-track railway line built by the Wellington and Manawatu Railway Company connected Tawa to Wellington from September 1885, and to Palmerston North from November 1886. It followed a circuitous route from Wellington via the Ngaio Gorge and Johnsonville. This line was incorporated into the New Zealand Railways Department network in December 1908. Tawa's first railway station, Tawa Flat station, opened on 24 September 1885. The station was located on the hillside above the valley floor on what is now Duncan Street, on the straight section of road about 180 metres north of the intersection of Duncan Street with the junction of Tawa Street and Tawa Terrace.
During the 1850s William Earp, the landowner of Boscobel Farm, planted a macrocarpa on his property. It became known as the 'Earp Macrocarpa' or the Bucket Tree as it was shaped to resemble an upside down bucket. In 2026 it won NZ Tree of the Year.
1930s and 40s: The Tawa Flat deviation From June 1937, the double-tracked Tawa Flat deviation diverted the North Island Main Trunk railway from Thorndon through Kaiwharawhara and two significant new tunnels to the Tawa valley to provide a shorter faster rail route with easier grades and higher speed curves. The new deviation reduced the travel time between Wellington and Tawa by 15 minutes. The old and new routes diverged in Thorndon and merged again north of the present-day Tawa Railway Station near the front entrance to Tawa College. Part of the old rail route through Tawa, from Tawa Street to Tawa College, became the southern part of Duncan Street while the old railway alignment from Tawa Street to Takapu Road remained as a pleasant walking track.
The new deviation provided two new railway stations that opened on 20 June 1937, one at Takapu Road and a new Tawa Flat Railway Station on an island platform built on the valley floor, below and 400 metres north of the old railway station. A crossing loop was provided at Tawa Flat with crossovers north and south of the station to allow trains to terminate at Tawa Flat and return to Wellington or Porirua. A siding was provided to support local businesses. The new Tawa Flat station was equipped with an enclosed waiting room, toilets for men and women, and a stationmaster's office with a ticket sale window opening to the waiting room. A miniature lever frame allowed signals to be locally controlled. Trains between Kaiwharawhara and Tawa ran on double line automatic signalling. The tablet system remained in use on the single line section from Tawa to Porirua.
With the completion of the deviation, the railway connection between Johnsonville and Tawa was severed on 19 June 1937. The original line from Wellington to Johnsonville was electrified and reopened as the Johnsonville Branch.John Yonge (editor), New Zealand Railway and Tramway Atlas, fourth edition (Essex: Quail Map Company, 1993), 16. The railway line from Tawa to Porirua remained single track with no stations between Tawa and Porirua until the new Linden station opened on 28 July 1940.
Electrification of the North Island Main Trunk was completed from Wellington to Paekakariki in 1940 and a modern automatic signalling system was installed to enable trains to operate at frequent intervals. From 1940, the shorter and faster train service to Wellington using passenger cars hauled by electric locomotives made Tawa a more desirable place to live.
Arohata Women's Prison, located at the southern end of Tawa, was built in 1944 and was originally a women's borstal. It became a youth prison in 1981 and a women's prison in 1987.
1950s and 60s: improved train service, motorway opening, rapid population growth
A much improved, faster, and more frequent, rail service resulted from the Tawa Flat deviation in the late 1930s, electrification of the railway line with an automatic signalling system in 1940, and the arrival of additional electric multiple units in the late 1940s and early 1950s. The first multiple units operated on the line from 5 September 1949 but electric locomotive-hauled trains continued to operate in peak periods as there were insufficient multiple units until the arrival of the first Ganz Mavag EM/ET units in 1982.
It was now quicker and easier for residents of Tawa to commute to Wellington to work in the central Wellington area. Travel time by rail from Tawa to central Wellington was now less than from many Wellington City suburbs and the fares were competitive.
On 15 December 1957, the duplication of the railway line from Tawa to Porirua was completed and a new Linden railway station on an island platform replaced the old shelter. With the duplication to Porirua, double line automatic signalling was extended from Tawa to Porirua and the tablet system was removed. The miniature lever frame controlling the signalling in Tawa could now be "switched-out" to automatic double-track operation or "switched-in" when required for shunting of goods trains or other movements requiring the use of the crossovers. This meant that Tawa station only require manning for occasional train movements.
Two new railway stations were built in the 1960s to meet the growing demand for rail services: Kenepuru station opened on 8 April 1963 and Redwood station on 15 December 1963. Tawa was now served by five railway stations. A feature of the new Redwood station was the staggering of the platforms north and south of the level crossing at Tawa Street to avoid the excessive operation of the warning lights and bells and barrier arms at the Tawa Street level crossing.
During the 1950s, the high-speed Johnsonville–Porirua Motorway was built through Tawa on the eastern side of the valley. The first section that broadly followed the line of the old North Island Main Trunk railway from Johnsonville to the Tawa turnoff at Takapu Road at the southern entrance to Tawa was opened on 15 December 1951. The second section, from Takapu Road to Porirua, was opened about five years later and the Johnsonville bypass connecting the south end of the motorway to the top of Ngauranga Gorge about the same time. The first section, from Johnsonville to Takapu Road, reduced road travel times and considerably improved access to Wellington by eliminating the need to use the narrow winding road through the bottom of the valley and Glenside. The second section allowed through traffic to bypass Tawa reducing traffic on the Main Road in Tawa. The southern and northern accesses to Tawa were improved by straightening and widening narrow sections of the Main Road at Takapu Road and Kenepuru Drive between Linden and Porirua.
Demand for new housing diminished in the 1930s and early 1940s, but from the mid-1940s a country-wide surge in marriage and birth rates occurred. With a shortage of suitable new housing areas in Wellington City, and with Tawa now more accessible with improved road and rail access, Tawa became a popular place for new private housing. Land was at a premium in the steep terrain of the Wellington region and the flat areas and moderate hills of Tawa were attractive. The Tawa microclimate, sometimes up to five degrees Celsius warmer than Wellington when the foehn effect occurs at the tail end of a southerly wind, was an added attraction. It could be fine and warm in Tawa when Wellington was cold and overcast. New subdivisions followed and the population expanded rapidly. Tawa became one of the fastest-growing areas in the country. State housing subdivisions at Kenepuru and Hampton Hill in the late 1950s and early 1960s added to the population growth.