Costs jump $26m on Victoria University’s Living Pā project
Thursday, 28 December 2023
Victoria University’s Living Pā is finally taking shape on Kelburn Parade ‒ four years after the project was first designed and for $26 million more than the original cost.
Where a row of Victorian villas once stood construction is now well underway on one of few projects to have escaped axing as Te Herenga Waka - Victoria University worked to overcome financial challenges including a $34m deficit this year.
The Living Pā was originally due to be completed by now, at a cost of $35m, but in 2022 projections jumped to $52m. The project is now slated to be completed by the end of next year at a cost of $61m.
That jump in cost was criticised by Taxpayers’ Union campaigns manager Connor Molloy, who questioned the increased budget approval at a time when the university was struggling financially and staff had been made redundant.
The university should halt all work on the “vanity project”, he said, adding the amount spent on it would have helped cover the deficit.
Site preparation works began in 2020 before the rising costs of construction became apparent, with the site’s ground condition also posing significant challenges, the university said.
The project had reached a stage where any attempt to save money by redesigning, delaying, or cancelling it would actually result in higher costs than the approved budget.
“The financial sustainability project has put a lot of pressure on everybody. We are fortunate the pā was already in flight,” Professor Rawinia Higgins, deputy vice-chancellor Māori, said.
The project has been on the capital works building programme since the university’s wharenui, Te Tumu Herenga Waka, opened next to the site in 1986, as an “accompanying dining room”.
When complete, the living pā will be a place for the “big conversations”, Higgins said.
Designed to be a sustainable living building, the three-storey pā is being built with minimal use of concrete and steel.
It will have a glazed facade, engineered timber cladding, solar array on the roof, and a closed loop water system. It must generate all its own energy, have its own water systems, be entirely carbon neutral and have used non-toxic materials.
Once completed it will be home to Te Kawa a Māui (School of Māori Studies), Māori student services, while also housing collaborative working, teaching, and marae engagement spaces to advance teaching and research models that draw on mātauranga Māori and emerging science and technology.
The project was in part influenced by Tūhoe’s Te Kura Whare, in Tāneatua, Bay of Plenty ‒ one of 30 or so other buildings which meet the Living Building Certification(LBC).
Higgins (Tūhoe) saw how the building served as a “bridge” of understanding to who Tūhoe were as a people.
“To me that’s what learning should be about … finding a bridge or commonplace that brings people together.”
Higgins said they had been “very deliberate” about the pā’s design so as not to detract from the wharenui which would be the “jewel of the crown in the whole complex”.
“The wharenui was literally built by the hands of staff and students. They did the tukutuku, they did the painting.”
Positioned in the heart of the campus, the pā will become a “beacon for Māori students”, with the wharenui no longer hidden behind “what used to be some very old colonial looking buildings”.
Higgins wanted to give Māori students a sense that it didn’t matter where in the country they come from, there would always be space for them.
“We also believe in the kaupapa that it’s not just for Māori students, it’s for the whole university. We want to expand that space for the university, the community, for Wellington and the nation.”
With the building shape more evident, Higgins hoped it would provide a sense of hope about the university’s future.
Excitement was building, with some students choosing to defer their graduation ceremony until the pā is completed. A name has yet to be chosen for the pā.
“I’m very proud of it and looking forward to next year,” she said.