Mount Wharf

The Port of Tauranga at Mount Maunganui
Published by Dow Productions, 1976
Image courtesy of Justine Neal

The main export Port for the Bay of Plenty. One of the main exports through this Port is timber. The Wagner Log Grab for loading lifts 40 tons at one time.

Loading Logs, Mount Maunganui
Published by A.H. & A.W. Reed
Image courtesy of Justine Neal

From this overseas port, a few miles from the city of Tauranga, many hundreds of tons of logs are shipped each year, the largest contingent going to Japan. The logs are brought by road transport from the bush sites to the wharves.

Mt. Maunganui, Tauranga, N.Z., The Wharves
Published by Gladys M Goodall, c. 1960
Image courtesy of Justine Neal

Stacks of timber behind the F-shaped wharf are clues to the importance of Mount Maunganui, the main port for the Bay of Plenty. Every year  over 112,000 tons of paper and newsprint, 283,000 tons of timber and softwood, and 64,000 tons of woodpulp are loaded here. This is almost all New Zealand’s export trade of paper and woodpulp and 90 per cent of her timber exports. The total export value is 9 million pounds. The new harbour and wharves have been built since 1952 when the application of the trace element, cobalt, to the soils of the hinterland, revitalised farming, and the exotic forest industry came to maturity.

Logs at Hewletts Road, Mt. Maunganui, 2015
Image © and courtesy of Brett Payne