Foxton

Foxton is a town in the Manawatu-Wanganui region of New Zealand. It is located on the lower west coast of the North Island, in the Horowhenua district, 30 km (19 mi) southwest of Palmerston North and 15 km (9 mi) north of Levin. The town is located close to the banks of the Manawatu River. The small coastal settlement of Foxton Beach is located 6 km (4 mi) to the west, close to the river mouth.
The 2006 census population was 2715.
Foxton was named after Sir William Fox, and has a history of flax stripping, which was used to make wool packs, matting, and rope. Other industries associated with the town have included clothing manufacture and sawmilling. The town is known for producing the soda drink Foxton Fizz, although the products are now made in Putaruru.

Climate.

The area is sand country with a temperate climate, average monthly temperatures ranging from 8 °C (July) to 17.4 °C (January), with a minimum/maximum of -4 °C to 27 °C. Foxton has an average of about 2,000 sunshine hours a year, and average precipitation of about 900 mm annually.
The prevailing winds in the area are west-northwest and have driven the sand back from the coast to create the most extensive transgressive sand dune system in New Zealand

History.

The first inhabitants of the Manawatu area were Māori who probably arrived in the thirteenth or fourteenth century.[6] Compared to other parts of the North Island the district was sparsely populated, but there was a major marae at Matakarapa, across the river from Te Awahou (now Foxton) as well as kāinga (villages) and pā (fortified villages) along much of the river.
A number of tribes have occupied the area; the Rangitāne had replaced the Ngāti Ara and the Ngāti Mamoe by the 1800s and were in their turn invaded by the Ngāti Toa and allies so that in the 1840s the site of Te Awahou (which was to become Foxton) was occupied by the Ngāti Ngarongo and Ngati Takihiku under the leadership of Ihakara Tukumaru.
Foxton is the oldest European settlement in the southern Manawatu, although it was not the first. The original white settlement was Paiaka to the east, closer to the present town of Shannon in 1844. When Paiaka was largely destroyed by an earthquake in 1855 the settlers moved downstream to Te Awahou, which was renamed "Foxton" in the 1860s.
In the early years of European settlement it was an important trading post and shipping port as the sea was the easiest way to transport goods and people to the Manawatu.
The Manawatu River was then the main access to the rich hinterland. The west coast of the lower North Island is not naturally supplied with harbours and the Foxton harbour had a dangerous bar at the river mouth. As the only real harbour between Wanganui and Wellington it was used anyway.

It was only with the advent of the Palmerston North-Wellington railway that Palmerston North began to overtake it as the most important centre in the Manawatu. The central government originally intended for Foxton to be on the route of the main line from Wellington to Auckland via Palmerston North and a tramway linking Foxton and Palmerston North was upgraded into the Foxton Branch railway in the 1870s. However, due to government delays on extending the line further south, a group of Wellingtonian businessmen established the Wellington and Manawatu Railway (WMR) and built their line along a more direct route that bypassed Foxton. When this line opened in 1886, Foxton's status as a port slipped, and this position deteriorated further when the WMR was incorporated into the government's national rail network in 1908.
The railway closed in 1959,