One thing that has always come through strongly when we ask residents of Uptown what they want for the future is that it should be a place where families can live and grow. The good news is, that’s happening – and it’s already changing Uptown.

We talked to some residents about raising families here and some very clear themes came through.

Steve Groves came to Uptown to build. His first home here, in Norwich Street, became a hub for planning The Citizen, the 93-apartment complex his company The Urban Collective was developing just a stone’s throw away in Exmouth Street and where he now lives himself. His son, now 17, has been “part of the journey since he was 11”. Proximity to Basque Park turned out to be a god- send when the pandemic struck and “every day during lockdown we were out there throwing Frisbees and softballs and it was just super- handy having that there. It’s a really good amenity.”

The other residents we talked to had younger families, but all said the green space of Basque Park was vital to the area.

Krister Samuel and his wife Ange moved to an apartment in Basque Road nearly four years ago and got “the practice kid” – a dog – before their daughter Stella, now three, was born.

“We’re just opposite Basque Park and it was very dog-friendly, there must be 40 dogs around that park!” says Krister. “We were in the city, in Hobson Street, where it’s extremely intense. We wanted to have a family and because of my work I needed to be connected to the city in a way that was still walkable. Being just that bit further out, you’ve got connection to the Domain, Mt Eden, Basque Park. I think it’s for people that want to live in the city but still be connected to green space.”

Krister’s work – he’s an estate agent and his company recently acquired a property management business that is moving to Uptown soon – gave him some handy insights.

“I’m a real estate agent, so I know how to spot value. Ours was a leaky building that’s been fixed, so I’d had my eye on the building for some time. They’re big floor plates built in the 90s, they tend to be a bit more generous than the newer ones. And once a leaky building’s been fixed it’s the equivalent of new from a compliance and warranty perspective.

“If you go a kilometre in any direction, it’s 30- or 40% more expensive. There’s this pocket around Eden Terrace where there’s great value. And there’s a great little village vibe. There’s cafés and bars and it’s the start of beer mile all the way down to Kingsland.”

“That’s what drew us to the area,” agrees Andrew Court, who moved into the Memphis building on Rendall Place with his partner Aly in 2019. “We couldn’t quite afford to buy in Ponsonby, but prices dropped by a couple of hundred thousand on this side of the motorway. And you got more for your money.”

They had been renting an apartment in Ponsonby “and we both kind- of thought, well, having land while we’re in our late 20s-early 30s doesn’t really seem like us. We were more about the accessibility to the lifestyle we had, which was the nightlife and the city vibes. We used to joke that our ‘Waitākere walks’ were through the streets of Auckland.”

Their daughter, Cooper, came along 18 months ago and Andrew says she loves the interaction with people in the apartment complex. “There’s always people coming and going and she’ll chat with them. The community on our side of the complex are young professionals at that step between forming their relationships with partners and having a family themselves, but they’re all very accepting of Cooper, which is nice. You don’t want to live in a complex where your neighbours complain because your baby’s crying.”

Both Andrew and Aly work and they were pleased and surprised to find that Uptown has a wealth of childcare options. They chose one “just far enough away that me walking Cooper there can count as a little bit of exercise,” says Andrew. Krister and Ange were similarly pleased with their options and chose the Bear Park centre in Akiraho Street, which Krister says is “a brilliant kindergarten. The teachers there are fully engaged and they’re lovely people.” 

Thomas Scovell and his wife Emily had their sights on a Parnell daycare centre near his workplace when they moved into 59 France Street two years ago but, he says, “lucked in” when that was full and they discovered there were so many options on their doorstep.

They were both used to apartment living, having come from London, where their two year-old daughter, Sadie, was born during lockdown (“anything feels expansive after that”) and they were delighted to discover more recently that Lucy Martin School of Dance had moved into Uptown from its former home in Grey Lynn. Sadie is now enrolled there and Thomas sees that move as part of a demographic trend.

“I get the feeling there’s more younger families now in this area, for cost and convenience reasons, and so businesses like that who are looking to serve pre-school or primary kids are realising there’s a growing population of people with kids. Whereas areas like Grey Lynn have probably aged up quite a bit. With the newbuild apartments, you see people in their thirties having their first kid, so it makes perfect sense for businesses like that to open up here to serve them.”

Steve has seen the trend develop.

“In the building I live in there’s 93 apartments and I know there are quite a few people who’ve had babies while living there. And at the other end of the scale there’s a gentleman on my side of the building who was born on Pearl Harbor Day in 1941. The older people say moving into an apartment building rather than a retirement village has reinvigorated them.”