On 3 July 2023 Bike Auckland released an independent engineering report confirming that reallocating a lane to walking, cycling and wheeling on the Auckland Harbour bridge is safe and viable; kicking off our latest campaign to Liberate the Lane and connect this missing link. Read about this report here, and see our campaign site here.

This section of the Northern pathway shared path connects schools and – almost – connects to the Upper Harbour Drive cycleway. Originally designed to connect into Skypath, the Northern Pathway will eventually connect all the way from Albany to Westhaven. It’s being built in stages – so Constellation Drive to Akoranga is next! Of course we have a suggestion for them to help connect across Te Waitematā to Westhaven: they could liberate the lane on the Auckland Harbour Bridge! Read more about the Northern Pathway here, and our solution here.

 

Strong feedback from Bike Auckland and the community led to a separated bi-directional cycleway being built through the Mission Bay town centre (instead of a shared pathway). Although it will make more sense in the context of a linked up network, and there are still a couple of things which need to be improved, it is lovely to have a separated space to be in in this busy area! We’ve seen people enjoying bikes and scooters in this space, and it’s easy to hop onto the shared path at either end! More here.

Stage 2 connects together the already-completed stages 1 (from Glen Innes train station) and 3 (Ōrakei Basin Boardwalk) of the Glenn Innes to Tāmaki Drive pathway. Bike Auckland has spent hours giving feedback on draft designs, reviewing progress, asking questions, pushing for more funding behind the scenes, and calling for faster delivery, as well as advocating for local connections. These would link the cycleway to nearby streets making local journeys possible. John Rymer Place and the Gowing Drive connections, once they are built, will enable local kids to walk and cycle across the Pourewa Valley safely to St Thomas’s School and Selwyn College. Read more here.

With bike theft becoming a growing concern in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland, Bike Auckland investigated a range of potential solutions. The investigation pointed to community bike registration platform 529 Garage as being the most successful for deterring bike theft and reuniting people with their stolen bikes. Together with Christchurch City Council and Wellington, Bike Auckland brought 529 Garage to Aotearoa for a 6 month trial. Auckland Transport funded promotions and registration events across the region to help grow awareness about the initiative. The trial showed great success, and Waka Kotahi is investigating adopting it Nationwide. If you haven’t already, you can learn more about 529 Garage and register your bike here.

 

The Karangahape road enhancement project added protected cycleways along the length of Karangahape road, as well as beautiful rainbow pedestrian crossings, more trees, rain gardens, and improved bus access. The cycleways were hard fought for with a fantastic campaign by Generation Zero! We continued a positive relationship with the business association, and shared insights with Auckland Transport throughout the project. It has been embraced by the community, and the Karangahape road business association have stated that the first beneficiaries of the cycleway are actually everyone else using the street space – they have made the street quieter, and feel more welcoming to be in. Read more about this project here.

Originally a trial as part of Waka Kotahi’s ‘Innovating Streets for People’ pilot in 2021, by 2023 Project WAVE became a permanent (and much improved) connection between Nelson street and Quay street, completing the city centre loop! Read more here.

The Northwestern Cycleway has been extended from Lincoln Rd to Westgate, connecting schools along the way!

In October 2017, the Waterview Shared Path opened, completing a long-awaited link between the SH20 path and the Northwestern Cycleway.  Advocated for and won by Bike Auckland and the local community, it features multiple new bridges and local connections, and has fast become a community treasure.

The Quay St interim cycleway, with its protective planters and highly visible totem-counter, opened in July 2016. As with other central city cycleways ridership quickly exceeded targets: it saw 200,000 journeys in its first year. The cycleway was extended further east in 2018, and will continue along Tāmaki Drive in 2020. Meanwhile, the current Quay St works under the Downtown Programme will reduce traffic lanes and install a permanent cycleway.

Amidst a burst of bikeway building – and to help nurture neighbourhood bike activity and advocacy groups across the city – Cycle Action Auckland transformed into Bike Auckland. The new name and logo capture a clear and straightforward vision, underscoring our role as the voice of people on bikes.

The cycleway linking Upper Queen St to Beach Road via Grafton Gully was opened in September 2014. At the ribbon-cutting, Prime Minister John Key promised our then-chair Barb Cuthbert that more cycleways were on the way. The following year, that promise was delivered on in the form of the Urban Cycleways Fund, $100m of Crown funding that strategically unlocked local investment and launched a cycling renaissance in Auckland.

In 2010, the SH20 route was completed with a path along the northern edge of Puketāpapa/ Mt Roskill, thanks to a strong partnership between cycling advocates, the Mt Roskill Borough Board, Ngāti Whātua Ōrākei, Auckland Council, and the Transport Agency. Shown: Board Chair Richard Barter inviting Cycle Action’s John Gregory to ride the mountainside path, on opening day. (Image: John McKillop, ACTA). Nurtured by the Puketāpapa Local Board, the Roskill Greenways continue to bloom with this collaborative approach, with the 2019 Te Auaunga/ Oakley Creek Restoration project the latest jewel in the crown.

The public yearning to be able to walk and bike over the Auckland Harbour Bridge swelled as the bridge’s 50th anniversary approached in 2009. The Get Across movement drew thousands of people to rallies, culminating in a breakaway crossing, and the creation of SkyPath: a citizen-led design championed by former Cycle Action Auckland chair Bevan Woodward and colleagues.

Astonishing to think that it was only in 1999 that the city’s first painted on-road bike lanes appeared on Carrington Rd, won by Kurt Brehmer and other advocacy pioneers. Even more astonishing: twenty years on, these lanes remain paint-only.

Under the umbrella of Cycle Action New Zealand, advocates led by David J. Knight campaigned for a bike path along the NW motorway. Five years of patient lobbying led to a rule change allowing facilities for pedestrians and cyclists to be built on motorway reserve land. Thus, on 6 December 1992, the causeway from Te Atatū to Point Chevalier became home to the very first off-road separated cycleway on Transit land. This watershed moment paved the way not just for the NW cycleway, but also for networks of walk-bike paths all over the country. Especially since the Waterview Board of Inquiry, motorway expansion and widening projects now generally come with walking and biking access included.

In the 1970s, against a backdrop of petrol shortages and a move towards sustainability, Friends of the Earth set up PATH (Pathways Across The Harbour) to campaign for bike access to the Auckland Harbour Bridge. They drew support from people all over the city, especially residents of Northcote and nearby suburbs who wanted to bike to work in the city.

In 1974, during a bus strike, two lanes of the Auckland Harbour Bridge were closed to traffic to allow people to walk and bike. Trevor Lanigan borrowed his daughter Monica’s Raleigh 20 and pedalled from Birkenhead to his job at the Central Post Office. (Image: NZ Herald)