These five Phoenix palms were originally planted circa 1965 (see the crop of the black and white 1980 aerial photo below [1]) about 50 metres to the north of where they now grow in front of Wellington Hospital. A major redevelopment of Wellington Hospital finished in 2008, and these palms were dug up from their original site, stored, and then transplanted on 1 June 2008 [2]. This replanting is not long after Phoenix palms were declared a ‘pest plant’ in Auckland, the effort going into transplanting this group shows that the landscape effect of a group of Phoenix palms still has currency. As can be seen from the photos, none of the palms suffered from transplanting, and their landscape effect should only grow as they gain in height and stature ( Lloyd, M., 2023).

References:
1. Aerial view of Newtown, Wellington, with Wellington Public Hospital buildings in the centre. Dominion Post (Newspaper): Photographic negatives and prints of the Evening Post and Dominion newspapers. Ref: EP/1980/2567-F. Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington, New Zealand. /records/23153491
2. ‘Tree transplant at Wellington Hospital’, The Dominion Post, 2 June 2008, Edition 2, p. 8.