Harbour pilotage is the ‘navigation of a vessel through restricted and shallow waters to an allocated berth and safely mooring her thereat, without incurring any damage to either the ship, or to harbour works and plant.’ A harbour pilot boarded the incoming or outgoing vessel and in a long harbour with a narrow entrance between North Spit and Taiaroa Head, a narrow channel with sandbars nearby, and rocky islands to negotiate, Otago Harbour was a challenge to seafarers. Ships needed a guide to take them through the heads and onwards following the channel between the sandbars to the deep water harbour of Port Chalmers. In the early years of settlement, the Governor had the authority to appoint pilots – Governor Grey appointed Richard Driver as official pilot in 1847. Driver was stationed at Taiaroa Heads and had to row the considerable distance into Dunedin once a month to collect his pay. At first, pilots at the Lower Harbour were stationed at Taiaroa Heads or Port Chalmers. In 1868, the control of the pilot service was transferred to the Provincial Government of Otago, which constituted the Otago Pilot Board in 1864. Pilots were key to the smooth operation of harbour services. Once a formal pilot service was established, pilots were usually Foreign Going Master Mariners, skilled in ship handling. The Provincial Government’s involvement was short, and in the early 1870s, control reverted to the Commissioner of Customs. Once the Otago Harbour Board was constituted, it took over control of pilotage. Captain John Louden was chief pilot under the Otago Provincial Government, and under the Harbour Board. The first pilot station was located at Taiaroa Head above what is now known as Pilots Beach. Access for ships was crucial, not just for safety, but for the economics of Otago. In 1883, for example, the New Zealand Refrigerating Company, responsible for the first shipment of frozen meat from Port Chalmers, wrote to ask what draught of water the pilot service was prepared to take over the bar, as the company had contracted to load five steamers with meat for London. Captain Thomson of the Harbour Board wrote that safe passage had been had by vessels drawing 22 feet (6.7 metres), but that since the Board had made improvements to the entrance he considered that vessels drawing 25 feet (7.62 metres) could be brought into port. Maintaining the channel was important – a mole was built at Aramoana in the mid-1880s. The beaches at North Spit, on the northern edge of the harbour entrance at Otago Heads were vulnerable to erosion, compromising the channel. Protection works included groynes to safeguard the channel, and a mole between Aramoana beach and North Spit beach. By 1909, the Victoria Channel provided a ‘fairway’ twenty feet [six metres] deep from Port Chalmers to Dunedin. At both ports were wharves, goods sheds and docks, all the necessities for big shipping. ‘The whole harbour is dotted with beacons and buoys and lights, and the board promises an efficient pilot service, and a big steamer finds her way to the Dunedin wharves at the darkest hour of the night just as readily as in the day time.’ The Otago Harbour Board decided to relocate the pilot station from Taiaroa Head to North Spit, on the other side of the channel, as the ‘most convenient situation.’ Architect Basil Hooper advertised for tenders for the ‘ERECTION of a PILOT’S RESIDENCE and TWO BOATMEN’S COTTAGES at the North Spit, Otago Heads for the Otago Harbour Board.’ The successful tenderers were Messrs Love Brothers, with their tender of £1,736. Hooper was also to design three cottages for lighthouse staff at Taiaroa head in 1914 (these were demolished in the 1980s to make way for tourist facilities). All three houses are weatherboard with Marseille-tiled roofs. The pilot’s house is larger, recognising the occupant’s status. All windows are four-paned with double-hung sashes. The boatmen’s houses have different external appearances, but have identical floor plans. Cottage No. 1 has a single, gabled roof, and a verandah with a steeply pitched roof. Cottage No. 2 has a hipped roof with two return gables, and a verandah with a flat roof. The floor plans show a kitchen, sitting room, and one or two bedrooms, a central main entrance hall and a cross passage, and a bathroom, scullery and one or two more bedrooms along the back of the house. Work was underway by December 1912. The foundations for the pilot’s house were completed and the boatmen’s houses were ‘well forward by the 18 December. By November 1913, the Pilot Station was complete, and the cottages were occupied by ‘the harbourmaster’s staff.’ The Harbour Board pilot service employees lived at the houses. Job advertisements for a ‘coxswain’ and an engine driver (for the pilot launch) both received a salary and a ‘free house.’ A jetty was built at North Spit, as well as a launch anchorage for use of the pilot staff. In 1917, two new water tanks were erected at each of the three pilot houses, and an additional tank at Spit jetty to provide water for picnic parties. There were some reports that ‘[b]oth designs and the construction of the buildings had been said to be far from satisfactory, and had been reported in the newspapers.’ Hooper defended his work, saying ‘special attention had been paid to the designing of neat and economic cottages’ and he could not understand the criticism. The Board denied any such comment had been made and passed the motion that ‘in view of the fact that the houses at the North Spit were passed to the satisfaction of the board’s officers, there is no intention to cast any reflection on the architect, Mr Hooper.’ Erosion problems were evident early on. In 1914, fences were erected to try and stop drifting sand, and filling work was completed near the pilot station. The pilot launch was a regular sight up and down the harbour. In 1920, the launch Inishfree was converted to a pilot boat, supplying visiting steamers with, 'An efficient and unfailing pilot service. And as the pilots are shipped and disembarked in the broken waters outside Otago Heads, the equipment of the new pilot launch has been carried out with a view to her performing her duties in practically any state of the weather. She has been fully closed in on deck, so that frisky waves may not be able to foam their way into the engine room. Portion of a big hawser has been lashed round her fore and aft, to prevent damage to her hull while the little craft transfers pilots to big liners in a choppy sea.' By 1923, communications had improved and access to a reliable powered launch meant that the pilot service could be transferred to Port Chalmers. The pilot service houses were sold into private ownership, and remain in private ownership in 2014, two available to rent as holiday cribs.

This historic area was registered under the Historic Places Act 1993. The following text is from the original Historic Area Assessment Under Section 23 Criteria report considered by the NZHPT Board at the time of registration. Description: The area proposed here for registration is located on the North Spit of Aramoana at the entrance to Port Chalmers, Dunedin. The area consists of three Pilots Cottages which are positioned on North Spit more or less midway between the 'Mole' and North Spit Jetty, The cottages are located opposite Harrington Point which is on the other (southern) side of Otago Harbour.