Frankton, Otago

Frankton is a suburb of the town of Queenstown in the South Island of New Zealand, formerly a separate settlement.

History

Frankton was named after Frances—the wife of the area's first European settler William Gilbert Rees. He started farming at Queenstown in 1860, and Frankton was established in 1863.

The Otago Witness of 14 February 1863 remarked that 'with all its natural advantages nothing can prevent Frankton being the chief township of the district'. The government moved all its buildings including the warden's Court and the gold receiver to Frankton. With no road between Queenstown and Frankton this created all sorts of inconveniences. The police at Queenstown Police Station travelled daily to the Court at Frankton. After a banquet in June 1863, hosting the secretary of the goldfields, and the police commissioner St. John Branigan, the decision was reversed.

Location

Frankton is located at the end of a large inlet in the northeastern shore of Lake Wakatipu known as the Frankton Arm, on State Highway 6. It is one terminus of the short State Highway 6A, which runs seven kilometres west from there to Queenstown.

Frankton is located on the edge of a larger area referred to as the Frankton Flats, which is the area of land approximately bounded by Lake Wakatipu, the Kawarau and Shotover Rivers, and State Highway 6 to towards Cromwell.  The Frankton Flats is located in the Wakatipu Basin and enjoys longer sunshine hours, particularly in winter, than the majority of land in central Queenstown, which is predominantly south facing.

Features

Queenstown Airport
Queenstown Airport is located at Frankton. The airport provides direct international flights to Australia, and domestic flights around New Zealand.

Remarkables Park
Remarkables Park Town Centre is a medium-large sized shopping centre in Frankton, and serves as the principal shopping area for Queenstown residents.

Queenstown Events Centre
The Queenstown Events Centre, operated by Lakes Leisure, is also located in Frankton and contains the main recreational and sporting facilities for Queenstown residents. Facilities at the Queenstown Events Centre include Alpine Aqualand (swimming pools and hydro slide), sports fields for football and cricket, cricket nets, indoor courts and events facilities.

Remarkables Primary School
A new primary school, the Remarkables Primary School, completed in 2010 in Frankton and provides the first primary school for the area. The building construction features sound proofing due to its location near the end of the Queenstown Airport runway.

Kawarau Falls bridge
This historic bridge was built between 22 December 1924 and August 1926.  It was constructed as a dam to lower the water level in the Kawarau River to enable the river bed to be mined. This idea may have been first suggested by Julius Vogel eighth Premier of New Zealand and Otago goldfields journalist in his 1889 book Anno Domini 2000 – A Woman's Destiny. The dam gates were shut from 15 June to 15 August. This caused the water to back up from behind the bridge to the Shotover River confluence. Less gold was found than expected and the project was largely unsuccessful. In May 1932, during the Depression, the gates were shut again for six weeks for unemployed men to fossick for gold.

References

External links
 Frankton Arm Webcam A view down Lake Wakatipu from Frankton.

Category:Populated places in Otago
Category:Suburbs of Queenstown, New Zealand