The Americans are on the march! Will Wellington welcome them again?

Dr Eric Crampton
Newsroom
21 July, 2026

BOLD

Hey Jamuel,

I've just put it up on UAT now:

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herald

Wellington has its share of urban legends, most of them false.test

One of the more popular ones, and a recurring social media trope, claims that America’s Army Corps of Engineers was prepared to build a proper motorway between Wellington and Auckland after the Second World War. And that the New Zealand government turned them down.

A more restrained version claimed that the Americans would have built Transmission Gully to facilitate movement from their base at Paekākāriki through to the port at Wellington.

To read the article on the Newsroom website, click here.

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