With light rail now planned for Dominion Road, and NZTA coming forth with timely new updates, people are starting to get their heads around what a major boulevard truly optimised for public transport round the clock might look like. For our part, we naturally picture it as including world-class bikeways. There’s space, bike use is growing, it’s a way to leverage your public transport investment, and really, in 2018, why wouldn’t you? In a Herald article back in July, the manager of the Dominion Road Business Association had a slightly different take: [Gary] Holmes said light rail down Dominion Rd will only work if it is about urban regeneration, rather than …
Bike Auckland
Last week, we proposed proper bikeways for Dominion Road as part of the light rail project – and we’ve been overwhelmed with the response. “Where do I sign?” was the instant cry. We have an answer for you! If you share our vision for safe cycling on Dominion Road, please add your name to the petition. We’re also counting on you to share the link and pass on the good news. You’ll be helping ensure that Auckland gets the absolute most out of this once-in-a-lifetime $6bn opportunity, by incorporating a strategic bike route into the big dig for light rail on Dominion Road. This is our chance to create a great green …
A recent guest post by Dr Rob Burrell struck a real chord. It was about the irony of how dangerous it is to bike to one of Auckland’s biggest hospitals – despite cycling being one of the healthiest commutes there is. Now, Rob’s anaesthetist colleague Dr Craig Birch follows up with his own story of how difficult it is to bike safely to Middlemore. Content warning: two grisly crashes, resulting in what would officially qualify as merely ‘minor’ injuries. I have cycled to Middlemore Hospital, where I work as an anaesthetist, for many years – since 2001. Unfortunately, safety issues have meant that I’ve had to resort to getting in my car …
AT is consulting on an upgrade to the shared path at Western Springs, on the south side of Great North Road as it passes the sports grounds and MOTAT – a key pathway for kids en route to local schools. Feedback is open until Monday 7 May 2018 – please take a moment to add your voice! A quick feedback guide We see three things to support here, and three ‘could do better’ points: support the raised crossings that give priority to pedestrians and people on bikes support the widening for better footpaths/shared paths support the improved connection to Ivanhoe Rd please pay more attention to signage clutter along the …
The Grey Lynn cycleway routes – plus the related safety upgrades, including new crossings and traffic calming – have been paused for review since Christmas, and many readers will be wondering what’s going on. You can keep track of Auckland Transport’s official updates on this page, and you can also sign up for email updates by writing to bruce.thomas@at.govt.nz The review process The main thing to know is that AT has engaged urban design consultants Boffa Miskell to lead a technical review of the Waitemata Safe Routes programme. The review is in two parts – Richmond Road (including the West Lynn shops) and the Old Mill Road, Surrey Crescent and Garnet Road …
Plugged into the cycleway network on all sides, a short ride from a train station and future light rail, knitted into nearby neighborhoods and only half an hour ride from the central city, and with a transport plan to create bike-friendly streets inside a green campus… Auckland’s newest development could be our first Biketopia. Announced on Sunday, the government’s purchase of 29ha of Unitec land in Mt Albert in order to create affordable housing in partnership with iwi will bring 3000-4000 new homes – and 10,000 or so new residents – to what is, in transport terms, an absolute gem of a location. The land, full of history and heritage and …
Please take a second to support this quick-click petition to ensure that Auckland Transport and the Local Board know there’s heaps of support for livelier, lovelier neighbourhoods – in Grey Lynn and beyond. Decades from now, we’ll look back on 2017 and say: that’s when it changed. That’s when Auckland reclaimed its urban mojo, stared the data squarely in the face, looked afresh at the vast swathes of tarmac that criss-cross our city… and got back on its bike. It was the numbers, we’ll say. A sudden rise on the automatic counters along Auckland’s bike paths, well in advance of the usual late summer spike. A ‘network effect’ as newly …
Part 1 in a short series on the planned walking and biking improvements for Pt Chevalier. Feedback closes Sunday 23 April – read about the proposal here, and have your say ASAP! I love Pt Chev for many reasons – not least, because it’s literally got a point: it’s a near-perfect triangle, about as wide as it is tall, leading to a tree-clad promontory into the harbour. I love that you can walk it end to end in half an hour, or dip in and out of the cul-de-sacs to rack up your 10,000 steps. I love the way local kids can learn all the streets. I love the grey herons and magpies who shout at each other in …
Mt Albert Town Centre urgently needs your help, to rescue it from a people-unfriendly design that’s been sprung on everyone at the last minute. As our mates from Generation Zero put it in a recent mailout: just when we all thought we were ending the year on a high note, “Auckland Transport did something dumb and now we need you to stand up for bike lanes yet again.” Here’s the quick link because time is short: hop over here, click the blue button to ‘HAVE YOUR SAY ONLINE’ and support Option 3 now. Feedback closes Friday 16 December! For the full background, see our previous post, with FAQs about crucial aspects of the design. Here’s the …
What is this, Groundhog Day?? Auckland Transport is suddenly backpedalling on a plan for new bike lanes that were meant to form part of a long-awaited town centre upgrade and a key link in the planned cycle network. Worse: this U-turn uses a new ‘preferred option’ from AT that runs contrary to the original public response, the preferences of the Local Board and the local MP, and AT’s own plans for the cycling network. Not to mention the goal of a 30% increase in urban cycling numbers after 2018. Plus, it’s being rushed through quickly, in the weeks just before Christmas! The quick version: AT is proposing to remove the new cycle lanes from Mt Albert town centre in …
We’ve written before about the proposed East-West Link, which would run a major highway along the northern edge of the Onehunga inlet, with significant impact on the township’s interface with the water. Plans are progressing, and while there are some good bike facilities proposed as part of the design, it’d be fair to say we’re still not in love with the idea as a whole. Meanwhile, the local community has been evolving its own plan. Our friends from the Aotea Sea Scouts have asked us to spread the word about this meeting to discuss it: There’s a community meeting at the Onehunga RSA on Monday 14th November at 6:30pm to discuss the Community …
Some of you may have been wondering how the (ongoing) Waterview Shared Path construction is going. And we know that some of you have really started to worry about the New Lynn-Avondale-Waterview path, because things have been so quiet from the official side recently. Well, have no fear. There have been some temporary setbacks, but some good people are hard at work overcoming them (hopefully in time for the overall dates to not slip seriously). Waterview Shared Path On the Waterview Shared Path, the most visible works are at the Alford Street Bridge, crossing over to Unitec. These works are going along well – the Well-Connected Alliance (the same folks …
Earlier in the year, Auckland Transport asked for feedback on cycling in and through the inner west suburbs, from Pt Chev to the city. That feedback (865 submissions!) has now been compiled and analysed, and the result is a refreshed plan. There are major cycling improvements on the way over the next few years, and others to follow. You can read more about the detailed public feedback in the consultation report – AT has created a couple of maps that give an overview of the volume and location of people’s thoughts about routes and obstacles. (Click for PDFs: 1, 2) And here’s the revised network map, as a response to that feedback (click here for PDF version): The red …
Deadline alert: public feedback on the East-West Link closes TODAY! This is the project that intends to reclaim the northern shore of the inner Manukau to create a highway link between SH1 at Mt Wellington and SH20 at Onehunga. Add your voice! In the interests of speed, we’re attaching screenshots of our official feedback (scroll down) – please feel free to echo our thoughts if they match yours. LINK FOR FEEDBACK – Have Your Say Today! It only takes a minute to fill in. For context: we’ve never been crazy about this one, even though the project proposes to incorporate new cycleways on both the water side and the land side of the motorway, and even along the water’s …
We recently received an update from the people at the Waterview Alliance, the motorway and tunnel builders who are now also building the Waterview Shared Path. The great news is that work is coming along nicely, and we are now seeing progress on the three key bridges of the project – the Alford Street Bridge linking Waterview suburb with the Unitec Campus, the boardwalk between Phyllis Reserve and Harbutt Reserve, and the rail overbridge at Soljak Street. Here’s what the Alliance has to say on the progress: It’s so great to see construction under way – especially when like many of us, you have waited a long 5 years since the original Board of Inquiry …
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