KEY POINTS:
Gary Taylor, an environmentalist whose views I rarely share but am always keen to hear, left me an anxious phone message midweek. "I want to have my pennyworth on this great stadium debate," he said. "I think Trevor's hyperventilating."
As a "Labour supporter, I guess", he thought it,
"one of the stupidest ideas I have heard from a Labour Government for quite some time. The idea that you can make a decision in a couple of weeks, or even a couple of months if that is the time they've been working on it, which I doubt, is just ridiculous.
"The potential for interference with the Port Company operations is significant and that is the lifeblood of the Auckland economy. The visual impact on the waterfront is huge; it would block the view of the waterfront from people looking out at it, and people inside the stadium don't need it because they are looking down at the pitch.
"It is one of those things that doesn't need to be located on the coast. It needs to be slowed down. I am not an advocate for Eden Park or Carlaw Park or North Harbour Stadium but any of them could work; any of them could be adequately serviced by public transport.
"We need to calm down and make some considered decisions, instead of this hyperventilating, rushing, macho stuff from the Minister of Sport."
That was more or less my view too until I took a walk down to the waterfront site later in the week. I went in the belief that if I could mentally superimpose Eden Park on Marsden and Captain Cook wharves I would see a monstrosity protruding halfway to Devonport.
But the old wharves behind the red fence are bigger than I supposed. A massive and monumentally ugly transporter of heavy machinery was tied up at Captain Cook and it had about the same bulk as a grandstand.
Its hull was as high as a five- or six-storey building and looked nearly as long as a rugby field. Yet it was comfortably accommodated and did not protrude on the harbour.
It wasn't pretty, but neither were the cranes and wharf sheds on the wharves that Trevor Mallard is eyeing for a national stadium on piles. And as for blocking a view of the harbour, there is none from street level there. The red fence and the vehicles parked along its length preclude more than an glimpse of water.
Auckland has had vague and various intentions of doing something about that view one day and it's fair to say that never in the imagination of the wildest civic dreamers have those visions included a football ground.
The suggestion seems offensive somehow. It's not so much that it is all too sudden and opportune, though it is, but rather that a stadium for terrestrial sports simply should not be built over water. It seems sacrilegious to the elements.
Unless - and this is remotely possible - the stadium is redeemed by its design. It is beyond my imagination to envisage a building that can seat 60,000 people without ignoring the splendour of its location but when I saw Mallard's working design yesterday I was disappointed.
We could surely do better with that site. There's no reason a stadium has to look like a goldfish bowl. Give it a big glassy prow at the seaward end, or something.
"Stadium Aotearoa" could become this Government's most popular legacy if the design is right and if it is finished in time for the Rugby World Cup 2011. Those are fearful conditions, but when you contemplate spending $300 million of public money to expand Eden Park by a mere 12,500 seats, it is no wonder Mallard looked for alternatives. And when Helen Clark contemplated the dimensions of the Eden Park upgrade it would be no wonder if she decided rugby had reached the Rubicon for the residents of her electorate.
But Eden Park has one practical advantage over a central-city site that nobody has so far acknowledged. You can park a car within walking distance of Eden Park. It may be tough on the residents, but Eden Park's old suburban site means many streets radiating in all directions and even on big match nights you can find a park that leaves you with a reasonably flat walk, slightly downhill, to the ground.
Not so in the central city. Once the parking buildings fill, precious few spaces will be found in the Queen St valley, and you wouldn't want to walk over the ridges. The waterfront stadium assumes that rugby fans will come by public transport. Would you put your money on that? I don't think this proposition would pass the private investment test.
A stadium of world class is overdue. In modern stadiums you do not queue for tickets, or entry, or fast food when you want it. Television on every concourse ensures you miss none of the action. The facilities are clean and carpeted, the surrounds as leafy and pleasant as a park should be.
Eden Park made a good start towards modernity with its new north stand. I love its architectural references to a Roman colosseum and the way its tiered seating casts you closer to the action than you thought you could be at such height. Eden Park would be a sentimental loss to all rugby followers, but so be it.
Economically we are doing well enough to afford an indulgence. But if a stadium is going to take pride of place from working wharves, its design must be inspired.