Prestonville is a suburb and industrial area in the New Zealand city of
Invercargill
Invercargill ( , mi, Waihōpai is the southernmost and westernmost city in New Zealand, and one of the southernmost cities in the world. It is the commercial centre of the Southland region. The city lies in the heart of the wide expanse of t ...
.
The area is low-lying and at risk from flooding and
sea level rise
Globally, sea levels are rising due to human-caused climate change. Between 1901 and 2018, the globally averaged sea level rose by , or 1–2 mm per year on average.IPCC, 2019Summary for Policymakers InIPCC Special Report on the Ocean and Cry ...
.
In 1984,
Waihopai River burst its banks, inundating Prestonville "like a tidal wave".
It caused major flooding in Prestonville and other suburbs, leading to property damage, homelessness and job losses.
Flood banks were installed to prevent further floods.
In the 1980s, a 24-hour aluminum processing plant was established in Prestonville to support the
Tiwai Point Aluminium Smelter
The Tiwai Point Aluminium Smelter is an aluminium smelter owned by Rio Tinto Group (79.36%) and the Sumitomo Group (20.64%), via a joint venture called New Zealand Aluminium Smelters (NZAS) Limited.
The facility, New Zealand's only aluminium sme ...
. Locals successfully campaigned to limit the site's operating hours to 6am to 10pm due to the loud noise it created. The factory closed in 1994.
In 2018,
Fire and Emergency New Zealand
Fire and Emergency New Zealand is New Zealand's main firefighting and emergency services body.
Fire and Emergency was formally established on 1 July 2017, after the New Zealand Fire Service, the National Rural Fire Authority, and 38 rural fire ...
investigated a series of suspicious fires in Prestonville and other parts of the city.
Demographics
Prestonville covers
and is part of the wider
Prestonville-Grasmere statistical area.
It had a population of 27 at the
2018 New Zealand census
Eighteen or 18 may refer to:
* 18 (number), the natural number following 17 and preceding 19
* one of the years 18 BC, AD 18, 1918, 2018
Film, television and entertainment
* ''18'' (film), a 1993 Taiwanese experimental film based on the sho ...
, a decrease of 12 people (−30.8%) since the
2013 census, and unchanged since the
2006 census
6 (six) is the natural number following 5 and preceding 7. It is a composite number and the smallest perfect number.
In mathematics
Six is the smallest positive integer which is neither a square number nor a prime number; it is the second small ...
. There were 15 households. There were 12 males and 18 females, giving a sex ratio of 0.67 males per female. The median age was 45.4 years (compared with 37.4 years nationally), with 3 people (11.1%) aged under 15 years, 6 (22.2%) aged 15 to 29, 12 (44.4%) aged 30 to 64, and 9 (33.3%) aged 65 or older.
Ethnicities were 88.9% European/Pākehā, 22.2% Māori, 11.1% Pacific peoples, and 11.1% other ethnicities (totals add to more than 100% since people could identify with multiple ethnicities).
Although some people objected to giving their religion, 44.4% had no religion, and 44.4% were Christian.
The median income was $26,800, compared with $31,800 nationally. The employment status of those at least 15 was that 9 (37.5%) people were employed full-time, 3 (12.5%) were part-time, and 3 (12.5%) were unemployed.
References
{{Invercargill
Suburbs of Invercargill