KEY POINTS:
Heritage enthusiast Bob Macintyre is offering ratepayers a free alternative to a gold-plated encasement of the century-old Newmarket station building on a concourse high above railway tracks.
The Auckland Regional Council has been asked by its transport authority for $31.4 million for a remodelled station, including $5 million to move the building to an elevated concourse jutting off Remuera Rd.
That would have to be extra to $40 million which the Government agency Ontrack has pledged for two new "island" platforms to fit three sets of tracks, beside which there would be no room for the building.
Concept drawings of the station were shown to an ARC committee meeting in public session but released to the Herald on Friday only in response to an Official Information Act request.
Mr Macintyre is aghast at the plan, fearing the building would look like a large "boatshed up on stilts".
"It would end up looking like the Queens Head Tavern - never quite right. And that is what we do in Auckland all the time."
His first preference would be to leave it where it was built in 1908 under railways architect Sir George Troup, nicknamed "Gingerbread George" for his design of Dunedin's famously ornate station.
But failing that, Mr Macintyre is offering to move the Newmarket building, at his cost, to the site of a demolished station of similar vintage beside the southern railway line at Ellerslie.
That is just over a stone wall from his own historic home, which was in 1913 the first commissioned work of William Henry Gummer, who designed the old central railway station and the Wintergardens among other Auckland landmarks.
Newmarket Business Association general manager Cameron Brewer welcomes Mr Macintyre's scheme, saying he can find no enthusiasm among members for the concourse plan, which would "only create a complete hodge-podge" in such a tight space. He said if transport authorities could not restore the original station to its former glory, they should find another worthy home for it.
Auckland Suburban Rail Handbook author Sean Millar also prefers to leave it in place, but believes the concourse could be a suitable second choice - particularly if it meant restoring the building as part of a "working station".
Mr Macintyre is no novice at restoring historic buildings, having moved a 200-tonne bluestone cottage from Timaru to Lake Pukaki and rebuilding it to its original state.
He said the Newmarket building would be more visible to Southern Motorway traffic than the nearby Troup-era Remuera Station building and signals box, which are partly obscured by an embankment.
Although the public would not have open access, he envisaged turning it into a creativity centre where arts groups could hold occasional exhibitions.
Mr Macintyre, who owns a shipping freight company, offered a year ago to buy the Newmarket building and its signals box for a "peppercorn consideration" in return for removing and restoring it at no cost to ratepayers.
That followed an invitation from consultants for expressions of interest, and his discovery near his property of the remains of a 93m concrete platform.
He and wife Debra made the find while clearing weeds for native plantings on railside land they have leased from Ontrack for beautification.
They then found that the platform was part of a station built in 1908 and used to carry Auckland's gentry to Ellerslie race-day meetings before being demolished in the 1950s.
The couple have also leased an underpass and ramp through which rail passengers reached the race-track.
But despite determining it would cost no more than about $80,000 to move the Newmarket buildings, Mr Macintyre had no response to his proposal.
A regional council report refers only to the investigation of nine possible sites around Newmarket, out of which the Historic Places Trust advised that the concourse proposal was the most consistent with heritage principles. The trust concluded that, despite its elevation, the station's alignment would be maintained parallel to the tracks and it would maintain an important presence and link with central Newmarket.
But the authority's architectural consultants said it could have "an incongruous appearance" and might have to lose its three large brick chimneys, described as "a significant feature of the Troup Edwardian buildings". The council has asked the transport authority for more investigations on the concourse option and other fundamental aspects of the Newmarket redevelopment.
