Correcting century-old typo too costly for Franz Josef
Tuesday, 23 July 2024
A more than century-old typo in the name of an iconic West Coast landmark and town will not be corrected.
Ngā Pou Taunaha o Aotearoa New Zealand Geographic Board announced on Tuesday Franz Josef village and glacier will retain the existing spellings of their official dual names.
The board opened consultation on proposals to correct the spellings of Franz Josef glacier and township to Franz Joseph in November 2023.
The non-Māori parts of the glacier and village are named for former Austrian emperor Kaiser Franz Joseph, whose name is spelled with a “ph” rather than an “f”.
However, over time Joseph was incorrectly changed to Josef.
The erroneous spelling of the glacier and its namesake town has been widely used since the early 1900s.
Board secretary Wendy Shaw said the board received 150 submissions on the proposal.
She said 17 supported and 133 objected to changing the township’s name and 11 supported and 49 were against changing the glacier’s name.
“We also note that final decisions are not based on how many submissions a proposal receives, but rather the reasons provided in submissions,” she said.
Minister for Land Information Chris Penk said that, after considering the proposal and the public submissions, he decided the village and glacier names would remain Franz Josef/Waiau and Franz Josef Glacier/Kā Roimata o Hine Hukatere respectively.
The dual names were made official through the Ngāi Tahu Claims Settlement Act 1998 and are required to be used on official documents.
Penk said he decided not to proceed with the spelling correction because the community offered very good reasons through the consultation process to maintain the status quo.
“The community noted that having to change the spelling of the busy tourist centre would have been a further diversion from economic recovery,” he said.
Tourism operator Rob Jewell said there had been a strong sentiment against the proposal locally.
“People are pretty happy with the status quo. There would have been a cost. Oh my gosh, there would have been so many things to change. In a cost of living crisis it doesn’t seem like a priority does it?” he said.