When The City Sleeps
Most of us finish work at 5pm, but that’s when some are starting their day. Chris Schulz meets the night owls who keep the city running while everyone else is asleep.
Savana Light is armed with an easy laugh. She calls her closest workmates “bro” and “sis”. When someone asks her to do something, her reply is: “Sweet as.” In short, it’s hard to faze the 29-year-old. But, as she sits in her barrier-moving vehicle at the bottom of the Auckland Harbour Bridge, Light suddenly gets serious.
An oversized truck has come shuddering over from the North Shore on the inside lane, which is the wrong lane.
Light shakes her head. “He shouldn’t be there,” she says. “There are signs on the gantry telling trucks to stay out of those lanes.”
She opens her window, grabs the wing mirror and yanks it in. She does this at the start of every shift, with good reason: Light is about to have some very close calls with trucks trundling inches past her window.
It’s nearing 7pm on a midweek night. While most of the city is settling in for dinner and Netflix, Light’s shift, in charge of Auckland’s motorway network, is just beginning.
She’s one of thousands of people who work at night to keep the city moving. Emergency services are staffed, bakers crank up their ovens and security guards are on alert for alarms.
Light has been in roading for the past four years. She started out operating a stop-go sign and was promoted to site traffic management supervisor for Fulton Hogan as part of the Auckland System Management alliance.
She’s one of several people who knows how to operate the barrier mover, which is used to move the concrete median divider and ease congestion during peak times. It’s a custom-built machine and one of just a handful in operation around the world.
Light’s role is a crucial component in keeping motorway traffic flowing. More than 180,000 cars cross the harbour bridge each day. Without her barrier moves, there would be congestion, chaos and collisions.
Light loves her job and she’s good at it. Her teammates respect her, look up to her. She often gets a smile and a wave from passing drivers.
“You do get a lot of looks like, ‘Wow ... a girl’s driving that machine,’” she says.
Occasionally, she gets something a little more special: a flasher. “We laugh and wave, toot the horn,” says Light.
Lately, though, she’s been struggling with the hours. Working overnight and sleeping during the day is taking its toll.
Research into the effects of shift work reveal increased rates of fatigue, obesity, heart disease, strokes and Alzheimer’s. It also shortens life expectancy. In 2007, the World Health Organisation classified shift work as a “probable carcinogen”.
Light knows the risks. She relies on takeaways for dinner too often and is struggling with her hours. “I’m feeling a little bit tired,” she says.
When she was younger, Light didn’t mind it so much. She was ready to party with friends on weekends because she was used to being up at night. But that’s starting to change.
“Before, it wasn’t so bad. If you work day shift ... you’ve still got downtime with your family. When I go home, no one’s there because everyone’s at work. I don’t see them until the weekend.”
Then there are the immediate dangers. Working on motorways can be risky. “You see some silly people who do some stupid stuff,” she says. “We’ve seen people drive up the wrong way on the bridge ... people have done a U-turn on the motorway.”
Right now, Light’s biggest concern is those trucks hurtling towards her in the wrong lane.
“We’ve had some narrow escapes,” she says, then proceeds to prove her point. Light pushes her truck into gear, cranks it up to its top speed of 11km/h and sets off up the bridge.
The barrier-moving mechanism begins shaking and shuddering as the concrete blocks are
picked up. They slide through the truck and emerge one lane over, devoured and spat out as if by a very hungry caterpillar.
Auckland is smeared in the neon glow of night but Light and her teammate Renee, who is sitting at the back of the barrier mover, are too busy watching the road to appreciate it.
Halfway along the bridge, Light spots another truck in the wrong lane, one much bigger than the first that narrowly missed us.
“Here’s another one,” she says, shaking her head as a huge, red, truck-trailer unit passes just a couple of inches past her window.
Light exhales. “Some people drive through giving me the fingers like it’s my fault,” she says. “They’re the ones who shouldn’t be in that lane.”
Denis Riseborough walks up a grey flight of concrete steps, reaches into his pocket and pulls out a ring with just five keys on it. These days, the Auckland War Memorial Museum is accessed through swipe cards and pass codes but Riseborough, the building’s safety and security officer, still needs keys for a few select doors around the building.
He chooses one, places it in a lock, clicks it into place and opens the door.
“Not a bad spot, eh?” he says, walking across the museum’s rooftop and gesturing over Auckland Domain.
With sweeping views across the city and to the harbour, it has to be the city’s best secret vantage point.
It’s just before 5pm on a Thursday and Riseborough, 72, is showing off to Canvas what he considers the biggest perk of his job.
The museum’s rooftop is inaccessible to the public and most staff but Riseborough is up here every day to lower five rooftop flags, just before closing time.
Sometimes, he’ll arrive early to soak in the views. “It’s a 360-degree view. You can see all the big buildings, the boats going out,” he says.
It’s impressive, but Riseborough doesn’t let the views distract him from his job. He’s in charge of everything that happens in and around the museum overnight. Below us, he spots some skateboarders.
”[They] ruin the seats,” he says. “The benches are there for people to sit on, so they’re not supposed to be doing that.”
Chances are, whether you’re eating an icecream on the steps, enjoying a picnic on the grass verge or taking a stroll through the Domain, Riseborough knows you’re there — and he’s got his eye on you.
From his ground floor control room, lined with security monitors, he and his overnight crew of guards can see what’s happening all around the museum.
It’s a vital role: the museum is full of ancient artefacts, a collection of New Zealand’s heritage that spans decades. He doesn’t take his responsibilities lightly. “It’s our baby,” he says.
Riseborough’s been doing this for 15 years and he hasn’t even thought about retiring. “I don’t need to be working but I enjoy being here. If I was retired, I’d have to figure out what I was going to do,” he says.
Besides the view, there are other perks. The cafe gives him leftovers. His hours mean he doesn’t have to sit in Auckland’s traffic. Walking around the museum all night keeps him fit. He doesn’t have a family, so the hours don’t affect them. He uses his holidays to travel. “I’ve been to 53 countries,” he says.
He’s been working night shift since 1992 after being made redundant from a bank. He realised he was a “night owl” so asked a local security company for a job.
So here he is, wandering around the museum, all night, every night, a place he knows so well
If you think about other things, it’s not so scary. Maybe you’ll think about what you’re doing tomorrow, take your mind off it.
he doesn’t even carry a torch.
Some people, Riseborough admits, can’t handle it. He had one guard quit on him after just a single shift. “It can be darker in places, a little bit eerie, if you let yourself think about it,” he says. “We’ve had people say they can’t handle it at night.”
Rumours of ghosts in the building persist, especially around particular exhibits. “Some people say they’ve seen figures, people have said they’ve seen weird things at night,” says Riseborough. “The first time I was on, one of the videos started up [and] I went about three feet in the air. It scared the hell out of me.”
Since then, he’s learned a trick to cope with solitude. “If you think about other things, it’s not so scary. Maybe you’ll think about what you’re doing tomorrow, take your mind off it. All the guys [in my team] walk around thinking about some problem they’ve got ... instead of thinking, ‘That’s pretty dark.’”
Riseborough blames the ghost rumours on shadows or pillars or faulty equipment. He thinks people have been watching too many Ben Stiller movies.
After 33 years as a police dog handler, senior sergeant Pete Pederson has been paired with so many dogs he’s lost count. “About 11,” he guesses, when pushed. That number includes his current sidekick, Jango, who is “a lovely dog ... he’s got a few years left in him”.
None of them, though, have quite measured up to his first dog, Jedi.
“He was pretty special,” admits Pederson, who runs Auckland’s 33-strong police dog handler unit from its home base in Ellerslie.
“He could read me like a book. I basically just drove him to the scene of an incident and he’d do everything himself. All I was doing was hanging on for the ride. He was very perceptive.”
Once, while chasing an offender at night, he and Jedi were both stabbed. They were only off work for four days. Yes, they got their man.
Those are the kinds of risks police dog handlers take when they sign up for the job. Much of the work they do is at night, with Pederson’s team rotating through day, evening and night shifts, spending five weeks on each.
Dogs and their handlers are a crucial part of Auckland’s police squad. “Our main role is tracking,” says Pederson. “A dog at its peak, we would expect it to be successful in finding the person it’s looking for five out of 10 [times].”
When it comes time for their night shifts, no one complains about it. In fact, Pederson says the members of his team look forward to it.
“By the nature of our work, we tend to attract people who enjoy getting out there at night,” he says.
That’s because it makes their jobs easier. While night shift can take its toll on human circadian rhythms, dogs prefer it.
“Dogs in particular — and pet owners will know this — they come alive at night,” he says. “They have heightened awareness during the dark hours. Essentially they love night shift. The air is cooler, the ground temperature is cooler, so they actually work very well at night.”
Every handler is attached to their dog, physically and mentally. “It’s an incredibly strong bond,” says Pederson. It’s forged through their first year of training together and at home, where the dog lives with its handler and their family.
It’s there in every pat, cuddle, conversation in the car during a lonely night time patrol, and word of encouragement used to reward the dog when they’ve done something well.
Some take this a little further.
When Canvas asks Pederson about rumours that one dog handler treats his dog with a midnight chicken nugget feast after a successful night’s work, he laughs and confirms: “That’s Grant.”
Pederson has his own rituals: he’s been known to dress his dogs up in reindeer antlers and feed them festive treats on his front lawn at Christmas. He’s got the photos to prove it.
Jango turns 8 in August, which means he’s nearing retirement. He’s not out roaming the streets at night so much these days.
Pederson’s the same way. “I’m way too old and too busy looking after these reprobates,” he jokes about his role in charge of the dog squad.
Instead, Jango is used for school demonstrations and training purposes. Pederson says he’s got some legs left in him yet. “He’s in really good condition,” he says.
But those bonds forged over months of night shifts and apprehending offenders in the small hours are apparent when Canvas asks what happens to Jango when he retires.
Peterson doesn’t hesitate with a reply and sounds surprised we even have to ask. “He’ll stay with me,” he says.
This man and his dog will not be parted.
Jack Tame remembers his old routine well. His bag was pre-packed, his clothes laid out, and he shaved before he went to bed. His alarm went off at 3.30am but he always woke up 90 seconds beforehand.
“I’d step out of bed, stand in the shower in a bit of a fog, then get on my bike and cycle to work. I really needed that three minutes, with the wind on my face. That’s the thing that would wake me up,” says Tame.
Once he’d finished his short trip from his K Rd apartment to TVNZ’S inner-city studio, Tame would have his first cup of coffee at 5am, before going on air at 6am. “I would have five shots of coffee before 8am,” he says.
Tame did this every weekday for two-and-a-half years when he returned to New Zealand to co-host Breakfast alongside Hilary Barry in 2016.
It was the best job with the worst hours. Tame didn’t last, couldn’t hack it. He’s one of the many people who tried working night shift and decided it wasn’t for them.
“It affects every part of your life,” he says. “It affects your relationships, your ability to go out with your friends, going to a movie or the theatre. Going out to midnight was a huge effort — you’d be in a state of delirium by the end.”
Of more concern was the effect it had on his health. “When I started Breakfast, I felt young. By the time I stopped working Breakfast, I felt like I’d aged 10 years,” Tame says. “That’s only because of the hours. It’s like being jet-lagged.
“Your brain feels slow, you feel dusty, you feel like you’re operating at 75 per cent.”
Tame, 33, knows he’s one of the lucky ones. He
Jack Tame has a new appreciation of a full night’s sleep. used to bike past rubbish collectors working the same shift as him. And he’s still on air, joining TVNZ’S current affairs series, Q&A and keeping his role as Newstalk ZB’S Saturday morning host, positions that don’t require him being awake in the middle of the night.
These days, Tame stays out as late as he wants and doesn’t bother setting his alarm.
“I’ve developed a newfound appreciation of how amazing it is to have seven-and-a-half or eight hours’ normal sleep every night,” he says.
“I can comfortably stay out till midnight if I need to. It’s fantastic.”