Locke Keith: Auckland War Memorial Museum Site Empowering Bill — First Reading 
Locke Keith: Auckland War Memorial Museum Site Empowering Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:609;Page:6583] 
KEITH LOCKE (Green) 
: 
 As an Auckland Green member of Parliament I would like to congratulate the Auckland Museum’s director Rodney Wilson and his team on the wonderful new expansion project that this bill will allow. As the Minister has just said there is Government provision for $26.5 million towards the project costs of about $49 million and there is still a bit of fund-raising to be done. I think that we Parliamentarians should support that fund-raising to complete this project fully. But the money is there now to begin the construction of this essential development which will expand the exhibition space by 60 percent and allow the proper display of what is the premier museum collection in New Zealand. The museum has gone forward in leaps and bounds under its present leadership. I went there recently to see two excellent exhibitions—one of Islamic art and the other of the series of Magnum group photographs. That exhibition was packed as the museum often is. A huge number of Aucklanders and people from around the country and around the world go to that museum. 
 This new space will enable the museum’s collection to be displayed properly. About 3 years ago along with the Minister I saw a presentation by Rodney Wilson on the project and thought it looked impressive. As my colleague has just said—and Jim Peters referred to it too—the museum also has an important teaching mission with 65000 curricular students a year going through it. The museum has been so cramped that it has not even had classrooms. This new project will enable it to have two classrooms and to do its teaching work in a proper way. That teaching figure does not even include the non-curricular students. The museum has a very interactive approach as my colleague just mentioned. Already the “Weird and Wonderful” exhibition for kids is very interactive. I have taken many kids along there and they really enjoy it. Building on that participatory interactive model is very important. 
But the museum is not only for the public and for teaching. It is a very important research facility and is really part of our tertiary sector in that regard. The researchers at the museum exchange with tertiary institutes and some of its people go and teach in tertiary institutions. Its library matches the Hocken and Alexander Turnbull libraries as one of our major research libraries. 
The Green Party fully supports this development. My colleague has discussed some of the questions of parking but I hope the underground park will enable the museum and Auckland Domain’s main management Auckland City to tidy up the parking issue on the domain as a whole. It is rather dangerous at the present time on the northern and eastern sides of the museum with cars everywhere and it would be a step forward if the parking could be rationalised into an underground car park. 
Of course as my colleague has said we want to see an improvement in public transport in Auckland that will help people to get to the museum. Already as the Minister said there is public transport. The Link bus goes past it at two points—at the hospital and in Parnell Road—and a very good development is taking place with a local Parnell resident Richard Simpson leading the way in trying to establish a footbridge from Birdwood Crescent into the domain close to the museum. That is important not just for pedestrian access. There is a proposal associated with it to have a museum railway station there so that people can go by train get off go across the footbridge and get up to the museum. There are other proposals associated with the big regional rail development plan for Auckland—to have either an underground or a rapid rail service up through Auckland City with a stop at the hospital close by the museum. Hopefully with that big regional rail development we can get people into the centre of the city from the outskirts quickly so that they can travel to the museum by public transport and by rail in particular. 
The Auckland Museum is a jewel in Auckland’s crown. As Jim Peters said it is wonderfully located in the midst of a domain that is very much used by Aucklanders.