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Three Kings, New Zealand
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Suburb: | Three Kings |
| City: | Auckland City |
| Island: | North Island |
| Surrounded by - to the north |
Mount Eden |
Three Kings refers to both a suburb of Auckland, New Zealand, and the (formerly) three-peaked volcano that it is named after. Three Kings should not be confused with the Three Kings Islands, located off the northern tip of New Zealand's North Island.
Three Kings is located six kilometres south of the city centre, between the suburbs of Royal Oak and Mt Roskill.
The suburb is home to an ethnically diverse population of about 5,000 people.
Three Kings features a small shopping mall and supermarket complex called Three Kings Plaza. It also has a commercial area, a first-rate Accident and Medical Clinic and hosts the office of Phil Goff, Labour Party member and MP for the Mt Roskill electorate.
What is, or was, called "The Three Kings" was a collection of volcanic cones (actually four in number) sitting inside a much larger shallower explosion crater. Along the edge of this crater to the south runs Mount Albert Road and to the north Landscape Road. This volcanic field erupted repeatedly over thousands of years disgorging vast amounts of scoria and lava.
Massive lava flows ran from here to the Waitemata Harbour several miles away creating Meola Reef at Point Chevalier. These flows created lava tunnels which still exist under the current ground surface. Thus rainwater falling on Three Kings and the surrounding area is channeled underground for miles until it emerges at Western Springs Lake. Most of these lava tunnels have collapsed but sections of them form caves and can be accessed from private properties in the area.
The Three Kings area has been drastically quarried over the years for the red scoria it contains, and only one of the three large peaks (Big King) remains today, largely because of the water tank that was built on its summit at the beginning of the 20th century. Big King is the property of the Auckland City Council and being a public reserve will not be quarried.
However, the large scoria deposits in the surrounding area are still being quarried. The ground water level became a problem for the quarry in 1995, and Winstone Aggregates, the company operating the quarry, arranged with the Auckland City Council to supply the water to the region. However, as a result of local opposition to this arrangement, the water is instead discarded into the sea. The dewatering has lead to concerns about subsidence of the ground.