I did put some thought why I was thinking along those lines. I was amazed at the RNZAF Base closure suggestion and implementation but I was more intimately involved with the latest closure, the loss of the airfield itself.
Yes, it was sad seeing the history of the Air Force Base being destroyed but the RNZAF operations continued, just at another Base. Over the years there would have been many Bases established and then abandoned.
I think we all agree though that Wigram was special. It was just too good to be true in many respects, with many of the staff being able to buy houses and live just a few km away and with all the city had to offer on the doorstep as well.
Hornby itself though hardly noticed the change. Indeed the suburb has flourished and is fast becoming the centre of business activity in ChCh.
The loss of the airfield itself was more pronounced though. I am probably a little unique in that as far as maintenance activity went I was pretty involved with both the military side and the more recent civil stuff.
I did some time sitting up at the top desk in Tech Sqdn, back in the day, and then a decade or two later probably laid a spanner on almost every GA aircraft operating out of the place.
I know where all those aircraft are now, it is grim. Really, really grim.
Maybe 30% didn't survive the closure, they may have flown for a year or so but that was the final straw. A dozen or more are parked up, some no longer on the register.
A few relocated but their hours are well down. Most would have left ChCh.
Very rarely do you hear a light aircraft in the airspace above the city these days.
It has gone from constant activity to maybe one or two a day, if that...
The pilots here will know what the halcyon days of GA were really like, for me it was the '70's when all those new aircraft were arriving and being assembled every week. All the Exx's on the register.
I flew with the Nelson and New Plymouth Aero Clubs and of course they would be unrecognisable as such these days.
I do mourn the loss of Wigram both from the RNZAF and GA memories of working on the field.
Personally though I am reminded almost weekly, if not daily, that we can no longer fly from there.
I have a feeling that the rest of ChCh is going to discover something similar in the coming years. Harewood is becoming more and more GA unfriendly, along with a few other aviation related organisations.
Flight sims and airline cadet pilots are having an effect and of course the recreational pilots now have microlights and LSA to play about with.
On a positive note the Wigram New World can't be too far from opening, I think it was going to be June or July.
It is on the Runway just as you come off the Northern taxiway and line up....
www.trademe.co.nz/property/commercial-property-for-lease/auction-710365269.htmthelandingwigram.co.nz/
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