Time for last shout at St George

The rafters may ring in the main bar at the St George Tavern in old Papatoetoe this Friday night. Manager Barry Cobcroft expects a big farewell crowd.

The Papatoetoe Licensing Trust pub, once a favourite South Auckland watering hole, is closing for good. Within weeks the almost 9000-square-metre site on which the tavern sits will be bare.

The Manukau City Council is buying the property, off St George St, in a deal yet to be finalised. It is working on plans aimed at revitalising the tired centre of old Papatoetoe with new development.

The site is next to the Main Trunk Railway Line and less than 200m from modern, newly built Papatoetoe Railway Station, where extra commuter carparks may soon be needed.

The tavern site is also next to the Allan Brewster community and sports centre.

It could be a best test of whether quality urban design will attract people to live more densely, but handy to 51 town and transport centres around the Auckland region.

The acquisition of the tavern site is no forced takeover. Gaming machines apart, the tavern has been making no money for several years. Built in the early 1970s, it was typical of many taverns around the country - big, open bars in low-slung buildings surrounded by huge carparks.

Manukau City councillor Noel Burnside, who spent nine years on the Papatoetoe Licensing Trust, remembers a profitable enterprise with all three of its bars packed on the busiest nights of the week.

But when most licensing trust pubs began to lose their local monopolies, the writing was on the wall. The now decidedly scruffy St George has in recent years been competing with many other liquor outlets, including the big supermarket next door.

Major turning points also came when police cars started parking outside large "booze barn" carparks. Today the lines that once divided the tavern's carpark have all but disappeared through neglect.

And the tavern's manager since January, Barry Cobcroft, says that while the one bar still running has been attracting up to 200 people on Friday nights, the new smoking laws have cut customers a further 20 per cent. (The St George has no garden bar where people might smoke.)

Present trust chairman Raghbir Singh says historic losses, diminished sales and changing social habits all contributed to the decision to sell to Manukau City.

Noel Burnside, chairman of Manukau's environment and urban design committee, says by taking total control of the site the council can determine what form any development takes.

The council also owns an area behind the supermarket, including an old rollerskating rink and the Papatoetoe Mall.

So it has many options to open out and plan the site, maybe including a reserve where the old Papatoetoe Railway Station has been moved and restored by railway enthusiasts as a function centre.

The licensing trust hopes a new outlet, possibly a bar-grill operation, might emerge in the new development. In recent years it has distributed $300,000 to $400,000 a year to local charities from its gaming machines.