Iconic workshop to relocate to Naenae
It’s the end of the line for one of the city’s first auto repair workshops that wasn’t part of a car dealership.
Don Mackley has worked at Waiwhetu Auto Services for 23 years. He and his wife Penny bought the business 14 years ago to run it themselves, but are being forced to shift out because BP, which owns the site, wants to demolish the 5-bay workshop and install a carwash.
Mackley has checked up on the site’s history and found the original 1953 application to put up the garage.
‘‘It was probably one of the first standalone purpose-built garages around. Most car repairs were done by dealerships back then,’’ he said.
Europa Oil owned the site at that time, during an era in which the Todd family was bringing in fuel from Russia and running its own oil exploration activities. Former All Black Bill Clarke at one time owned and ran the service station on Whites Line East.
Mackley says that in his 23 years at the garage BP have redeveloped the site twice, and that the garage and fuel operations had a symbiotic relationship. He’s lost count of the number of times he has been called to help a stranded motorist whose car had conked out on the service station forecourt.
The Mackley’s lease with BP wasn’t due for re-negotiation until 2016, but there was a clause in the agreement that the garage operators could be given three months’ notice of termination should the oil company plan to demolish buildings.
The couple are annoyed that BP gave them the minimum three months’ notice when it appears that plans for the carwash have been in the pipeline much longer, but accept ‘‘business is business’’.
Meanwhile, the Mackleys and their two mechanics will not be out of a job. They’ve found a new site for Waiwhetu Auto Services – somewhat ironically at the site of the former BP service station at 119 Naenae Rd.
They have a very busy Queens Birthday weekend ahead of them, shifting all of their equipment to the Naenae site in time to re-open on June 2.