Mechanics Bay

Mechanics Bay
Painting of Mechanics Bay in 1899, by Charles Blomfield.
Basic information
Local authority	Auckland Council
Surrounds
North	Bayswater
Northeast	Devonport
Southeast	Orakei
South	Parnell
Southwest	Newmarket
West	Auckland city centre

Mechanics Bay is the name of a former bay (now filled in) on the Waitemata Harbour in Auckland City, New Zealand. It is also the name used to describe the area of the former bay that is now mainly occupied by commercial and port facilities. Sometimes the bay formed between Tamaki Drive and the western reclamation edge of Fergusson container terminal is also referred to as Mechanics Bay.

Along the harbour shore between Point Britomart and St Stephen's Point in Parnell were four bays; Official Bay, Mechanics Bay, St Georges Bay & Judges Bay (some of these bays have now disappeared due to land reclamation and the quarrying of the bordering headlands). Closest to Point Britomart was "Official Bay" so-called because most of the Government Officials during the 1840s chose to live there.

Almost continuous with Official Bay was Mechanics Bay (so-called because this was where the labour force that the government had brought with it to construct the new Capital were housed). Mechanics Bay contained the mouth of the stream issuing from the Springs in the Domain to the south. The Bay had a broad, flat beach where Māori had long been in the habit of beaching their waka (canoes).

Next to Mechanics Bay was St Georges Bay and then "Judges Bay" so-called because three of the magistrates of the early colony built their houses there. Next to Judges Bay is St Stephen's point, where a small chapel was built.

As early as the 1860s this shore front began to be modified by the European settlers. In particular it was in order to get the railway tracks around to the bottom of Queen Street that Point Britomart was quarried away and Official Bay & Mechanics Bay filled in. Initially the railway tracks came through the gully that lay between the Auckland Domain and the suburb of Parnell, but later when a second route was formed further to the east through Meadowbank the shoreline between Mechanics Bay and Hobson Bay was also modified. This was when St Georges Bay ceased to exist and became the shunting yard for the railway station and Judges Bay was separated from the Harbour by a railway embankment.