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Kōrero: Streets and lighting

Open sewer, Queen Street

Image
Open sewer, Queen Street

The condition of many early streets was primitive. They were dust bowls in summer and quagmires in winter. This is Auckland’s Queen Street in the 1860s. It was bisected by a stream called the Ligar Canal – formerly Te Wai Horotiu. It was little more than an open sewer, and a hazard for the unwary pedestrian.

Te whakamahi i tēnei tūemi

Auckland Council Libraries − Tāmaki Pātaka Kōrero o Tāmaki Makaurau, Sir George Grey Special Collections

Reference: 4-400

by James D. Richardson

Permission of Auckland City Libraries Tāmaki Pātaka Kōrero must be obtained before any re-use of this image.

Ngā whakaahua me ngā rauemi katoa o tēnei kōrero

Me pēnei te tohu i te whārang

Adrian Humphris, Streets and lighting – Building and funding streets, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/mi/photograph/24474/open-sewer-queen-street (accessed 4 June 2026).

He kōrero nā Adrian Humphris, i tāngia i te 6 April 2010.