Albert Park

Albert Park's children's playground is a small, shaded play stop set among Victorian gardens in the Auckland CBD, best suited to families breaking up a day in the city rather than a destination on its own. Flowing paths, mature specimen trees and garden beds frame the space, and it borders the University of Auckland and Auckland Art Gallery, making it a natural pause point on a walk with children. The park itself carries far more history than the swings suggest, a Victorian garden built on the site of a British barracks and a Maori pa.

History and Cultural

The site carries three layers of history. The deepest is Rangipuke, a Maori kainga, and the adjacent Te Horotiu Pa at the park's northwest corner, both in use before European contact. Over that came the Albert Barracks, a British military fortification from the 1840s, whose surviving perimeter wall on the University of Auckland grounds is registered Category I by Heritage New Zealand. The park was formed from the barracks land in the 1870s and 1880s. Its Victorian fittings are notable: an 1881 cast iron fountain with dolphins, cherubs and Aphrodite imported from Britain, a bronze Queen Victoria statue cast in London in 1897 by Francis J Williamson, a 1901 bandstand designed by James Slator, a floral clock funded by Robert Laidlaw in 1953, and a rare Victorian gas lamp surviving on the Kitchener Street stairs. Two field guns from the 1880s Russian invasion scare complete the collection.

Access and Inclusion

The park has multiple flat entry points on Princes Street, Kitchener Street and Wellesley Street East, with paved, park standard paths throughout and two drinking fountains on site.

Practical Info

Address: 33-43 Princes Street, Auckland CBD. Parking is available nearby on Kitchener Street or Princes Street, and multiple bus routes run along Queen Street and Wellesley Street. The park borders the Auckland Art Gallery and the University of Auckland campus.