Shiny new columns for Whangarei Town Square
In an effort to connect the very popular Whangarei Town Basin with the centre of the city and to attract people into town, Whangarei District Council has embarked on the redevelopment of Cameron Street and James Street in the CBD. The design includes new paving, street furniture, planting and very shiny stainless steel lighting columns from CSP.
“Both of these areas of Whangarei have operated quite separately in the past with lots of people visiting the Town Basin,” explains Rachael Mannion, Project Engineer for the Whangarei District Council. “Our goal with this project is to link these two areas of the city and entice people back to the town centre by creating a pedestrian friendly, interesting layout and a narrow, one-way traffic calming lane which allows people to drive through the shared space.”
“This project involved a manufacturing first for CSP,” said Bruce Stephens, Sales Engineer - Auckland/Northland for CSP. “We were asked to produce marine grade stainless steel columns with an extremely high polish for one of Whangarei District Council’s signature street upgrade projects.”
“The decision to go with a highly polished stainless column was so that it matched with the other hardware, such as the bike racks, we have in the redevelopment so that everything is consistent,” explains Rachael. “We did opt for the very high polished finish because we didn’t want the tea staining you can get with just a standard stainless steel finish. The columns look amazing and we are very happy with the effect. The whole street looks great.”
“90% of the columns we install are standard galvanised columns so it was nice to install something very different,” says Bob Grant from McKay Electrical. “We have known CSP for years so dealing with them is not an issue. Everything went to plan and the columns look just fabulous.”
Rachael also says that the project will eventually be anchored by the construction of an attractive, futuristic canopy that will cover the intersection of Cameron Street Mall and James Street to create an all-weather space where mini concerts can also be held.
| “The columns were a new challenge for our manufacturing team to obtain such a high standard of polish,” says Bruce. “We also had to work to very tight time frames to get the columns finished to fit in with the completion of other parts of the project. It was all worth it as the columns look fantastic and bring an extra special shine to the town square.” |