When I first went to the lookout point at the top of Mount Victoria, I knew there would be a great view of Wellington harbour and city centre. What I was surprised by is one of the best views in my opinion is what I photographed here. Looking in the opposite direction of the city centre across Evans Bay to Wellington International Airport. On the right side of the photograph is the suburb of Kilbirnie and on the left is the airport runway. This was taken at 6:30pm on a winter’s evening. The sun had just set behind where I was stood over the city centre. I had my iPhone set up to capture a time-lapse of the planes landing and taking off.
The airport itself is the third busiest in New Zealand after Auckland and Christchurch. The runway length limits the size of planes that can land here, only international planes from Australia, Fiji and the Chatham Islands can land here. Larger, long hall planes need a longer runway. You can see from this view point that there is a plane coming into land over the Cook Straight in the background, flying over Moa Point just behind the end of the runway there. On the foreground side of the runway is Evans Bay as I mentioned.