Pōkeno: The town that nearly disappeared from the map, then mushroomed

Monday, 14 October 2024

The North Waikato town of Pōkeno nearly nearly disappeared from the map when it was bypassed by State Highway 1.

Then its population exploded.

However, steep rates are driving some newcomers away.

There’s a lot of ice cream being eaten in a town just over the border from Auckland.

Sitting in cars and along the short strip of shops at the heart of Pōkeno, people are devouring enormous, multi-coloured scoops of ice cream, even on a chilly day in early October.

The town’s legendary ice creams are a remnant from a decades-old 'ice cream war' between main street shops that pushed scoop sizes up and the price down.

It was an effort to get the throng of drivers zipping through Pōkeno along State Highway 1 to stop and spend, resident Patrick Clotworthy told Stuff.

But clouds of doom built over the town in the early 1990s as fears grew that Pōkeno would disappear from the map when SH1 bypassed it in 1995. Incentives for passers-by to stop, like humungous ice creams, became critical.

“Everybody gave us no hope,” said Clotworthy, whose parents Helen and John moved to the town in the late 1970s and started Pokeno Bacon.

Several main street businesses closed, people left town, he said.

“We kept doing what we were doing, in the end it paid off.”

The town’s growth has brought a steady flow of local customers, he said.

Census data shows Pōkeno’s population was 693 in 2013. By the 2023 Census, it had exploded to 6081 - although the 2023 count used a slightly larger boundary.

Lisa Walden’s parents were childhood neigbhours in Pōkeno, and she and her siblings grew up in the town.

Changes to the town have happened “really fast”, she said, including the recent arrival of traffic lights and a brand new roundabout.

Pokeno Village Estate started earthworks for its subdivision around 13 years ago, and once the establishing works were done, houses popped up quickly, Walden said.

She started working as a real estate agent in Pōkeno a decade ago, when four bedroom homes on 600 to 800m² sections sold for under $500,000. It seemed like a lot of money at the time, Walden said.

But prices continued to climb and demand sky rocketed, as builders pumped out houses, with buyers purchasing sight-unseen during Covid-19 lockdowns. In late 2021, the price of a four-bedroom home hit $1.45 million, Walden said.

CoreLogic’s chief property economist, Kelvin Davidson, said median property values in Pōkeno have followed national trends, but there was a big jump in December 2021, when the median value peaked at $1.2m - not quite double the December 2015 median value of $663,850.

The unexpected price

The data suggests new demand fuelled new development in the town, Davidson said.

But like elsewhere, as interest rates started to rise demand dropped, and cost increases meant builders couldn’t afford to continue pumping out new homes, Walden said.

Clothworthy said he worries about people who bought at the peak of the market, and steep Waikato District Council rates bills come as “a shock” to some new arrivals.

Jason Cullum was renting in Pukekohe before buying in Pōkeno in 2022.

“When we moved we didn’t pay attention to the rates. The first rates bill was $5000 for district council rates and $500 for the regional rates. We left as soon as we could.”

Cullum moved back over the border to Auckland earlier this year and nearly halved his rates bill.

Walden has also moved north of the border to a larger property with a smaller rates bill.

Clotworthy’s mother, Helen, said infrastructure has been slow to arrive.

“As far as infrastructure is going, Waikato District Council is still catching up. That’s really frustrating, although they’re doing their best.

“You see new developments happen and they have parks galore and pavements. We don’t have any of that stuff.”

Although the arrival of a supermarket in 2021 meant residents could shop locally without having to drive to Pukekohe.

“That’s brought a lot of people from the surrounding area that normally wouldn’t bother going to Pōkeno,” Clothworthy said.

Bursting at the seams

The town’s rapid growth is reflected in school roll numbers. On July 1, 2013, Pōkeno School had 148 students. It’s now at 629, principal Blair Johnston said.

When the town’s growth was still on the horizon, the Ministry of Education developed a master plan for the school based on a roll of 600 children, Johnston said. But the pace of delivery on the master plan is way behind where it should be.

“We’ve been dealing with property works on our site for about eight years so far, and there’s another five years to go.”

The school has 12 temporary classrooms and another two on their way. Those extra buildings have encroached on the school’s field, so break times have to be split because there’s insufficient room for all children to be outside at the same time, he said.

The rapid growth means “the only constant we have is change”, Johnston said.

“My head is constantly 12 or more months ahead of where we need to be to make sure the school operates efficiently.”

And the changing make up of the community is mirrored in the school.

When Johnston started at Pōkeno Primary in 2010, 50% of students were Māori, and 50% were Pākehā/New Zealand European.

“The highest ethnicity now is Asian, and predominantly Indian.”

The change in the community has brought opportunities for kids to experience a range of cultures, Johnston said.

“We’ve got an amazing multicultural community,” Helen Clotworthy said.

“We’re celebrating the Diwali festival at the moment and it’s huge. We celebrated Matariki in June, these are all events at our Pōkeno hall.”

Meanwhile, her son wonders if more could have been done in the development rush to make the town better.

“Maybe we could have turned it into something a bit nicer,” Patrick Clotworthy said.

“It was a stopover town where a lot of people didn’t care, but now it’s got that local vibe, where people take pride in their local town. We always knew it was a good place.”