CATHY VENINGA ditched her comfortable life in Parnell to take up residence in the central city. She has no regrets.
JEREMY HANSEN Cathy, would you like to introduce yourself first?
CATHY VENINGA Sure. I’m Cathy Veninga. I’m the CEO at the Designers Institute of New Zealand, a professional body representing seven design disciplines across New Zealand.
JEREMY HANSEN In the last year or so you made the decision to move from Parnell, where you’d lived for a long time, to the central city. What made you decide that?
CATHY VENINGA I was a workaholic. I was living off Gladstone Road in Parnell, and it’s quite a good community there, with a group of shops where you’re known by name. But I never made use of the proximity to the central city to benefit from what it offered – it was only a 20-minute walk to Auckland Art Gallery, but if it was raining or too hot I wouldn’t do it. I guess I got a bit bored with where I was, and I needed something to add more of a personal dimension beyond my work. So I saw an apartment advertised and by that afternoon I had visited it. I just thought “This is where I want to be, in the heart of the city”. I mean, it was slightly depressed coming out of Covid and there wasn’t a lot of buzz here then, but I knew it would build back. I’ve been here two and a half years now.
JEREMY HANSEN How have you found life in the city?
CATHY VENINGA It’s been exciting. I have a life. I have a nice little routine of things on the weekend: the gym, getting my flowers and vegetables at the Britomart Saturday Markets, maybe getting a coffee at Amano. I might wander through Commercial Bay and up Queen Street to Smith & Caughey’s for a look around that beautiful old store. I’m a member of the Art Gallery, and there are so many great restaurants within 100 metres. The building I’m in has 282 apartments, but it doesn’t feel like that – everyone makes an effort to be friendly. There are WhatsApp groups and various tribes within the building and people mix and mingle across those tribes. It’s a vertical neighbourhood: there are social barbecues together, going to art galleries together, to dinners, there’s so much social activity. I didn’t expect that to come with living the city on my own. I love it.
JEREMY HANSEN A lot has been made of crime in the central city lately. You’re a woman who lives alone. Do you feel unsafe living here?
CATHY VENINGA I’m a little bit streetwise, I guess. All my life when I’ve gone out as an individual I’ve been careful and cautious, but you do that when you’re travelling. I go to lots of events and often walk home at midnight and I’m just alert. I don’t let fear dominate: This is my city, and I want to feel I own it and live it and can be in it, and not let fear compromise my enjoyment of walking down Shortland Street on a beautiful night, and feeling the crispness and the joy of an empty street and my freedom of being able to be there. There is also hardship that you see on the streets, of course, and I didn’t know how I would deal with that emotionally because I have empathy; there but for the grace of God goes any one of us. It’s not their fault if someone is living on the street. So I’m always friendly and make a point of being open. I say kia ora and smile and wave, and usually people are pleased to be recognised and seen and have some dignity. You’ve got to look not with judgement but with compassion, and also be sensible. We need to see more support around mental health and addiction in particular.
JEREMY HANSEN Flexible working has had an impact on pedestrian numbers in the central city, although those numbers are consistently growing. Does it feel like things are changing for the better?
CATHY VENINGA The city’s come back to life. I think remote working needs to be reevaluated and I’m sure corporates are doing that, because every organisation needs an ecosystem. You need people to come back to work so they feel extended creatively, socially and collaboratively. I think remote work is creating social, psychological and emotional issues for people that I don’t think we’ll see clearly for some time yet. We need those people working here because the city needs life, it needs culture, it needs diversity in that culture. We are a human species and we love to connect and collaborate. I know it’s more comfy being at home and not dealing with the traffic, but when you’re here in the central city, it’s an exciting world to be in. There’s genuine diversity here in the central city, which helps break down barriers of judgement or racism. I love it every day.
JEREMY HANSEN What would you like to see change in the central city?
CATHY VENINGA More people back in the city, working and living. And a better supermarket option. I think most of us in our building still get in our cars and go to Victoria Park New World. Having that kind of amenity closer by would encourage more residents here, because they could avoid using their cars altogether. At the moment, most people in my building still have a car. We also lack event venues of scale – The Cloud needs to be pulled down. The Viaduct Events Centre helped grow corporate and cultural organisations, and we need more venues that can successfully do that, as they’re a whole ecosystem. Just as important: homelessness has increased and we should be ashamed of that and how we’re not taking care of people.
BUILDING A BETTER CITY
CATHY VENINGA’S SUGGESTIONS
1. Better support for unhoused people.
2. More residents and workers in the city every day.
3. Better supermarket options to encourage car-free living.
4. More event venues to offer flexibility to businesses and cultural groups who want to host events downtown.
