Two types of urban development
A week ago I took a look at some of the issues with our planning system here in Auckland, and how some of the basic rules around residential development seem to have consequences that don’t exactly seem to fit with our over-arching goals like promoting intensification and trying to provide some affordable housing.…
17 Comments The new bus timetables
Some of the timetables for the routes of the Central Flagship Project bus changes have been uploaded to the MAXX website – they take effect from August 21. We have:
The 020 and 005 timetables.
The 030 and 005 timetables.
The 010 and 011 timetables. …
10 million rail trips
A pretty important day in the history of Auckland’s rail system today, with the magical figure of 10 million rail trips over the past 12 months having been surpassed. There was even a celebration down at Britomart:
Rail patronage in Auckland has reached a record high with ten million passenger journeys within a twelve month period achieved today.…
Replay: Ticketing
In the early days of this blog I generally got about as many visitors in a month as I now do in a day. But there were some interesting posts written, many of which are still as relevant now as they were then.…
Hobsonville motorway opening next week
The next section of the Western Ring Route to be completed – a section known as the “Hobsonville Deviation” – is due to be opened to traffic the weekend after next, after an open day on August 6th. The NZ Herald describes the project a bit:
Combined with the 5.5km motorway section from Greenhithe to Albany, which opened in 2007, it will provide a seamless link between West Auckland and North Shore.…
The ultimate outcome of ignoring pedestrians
This is a pretty shocking video showing how pedestrians are treated along a major highway in auto-focused Atlanta. What is very interesting to note is how the USA is starting to see a shift in poverty from the inner city to the outer-suburbs – reversing the trend that occurred through most of the 20th century when the rich migrated to the suburbs, leaving the poor downtown: Watch the full episode.…
Auckland’s low PT use is not a “natural” outcome
At the talk I gave on public transport in Auckland on Tuesday night, I took a look back at Auckland’s transport history – in particular how in the mid 20th century we went from having some of the highest levels of PT use in the world to having some of the lowest.…
An inevitable photo…
Quite a few people I have met up with in person recently have asked how things are going with the little girl we had a few weeks back. Well here she is in a pretty inevitable hat – thanks to Auntie Bernice who did an excellent shop at the London Transport museum when she was there a few weeks ago: While she was five weeks early, and we needed to stay in the hospital for the first couple of weeks, little Adele Ophelia Clare is now doing great.…
GPS 2012: just plain dumb
Well I have had the chance to read through the final version of the 2012 Government Policy Statement for land transport funding and two conclusions immediately leap into my head: It’s remarkably similar to the draft version. All that “consultation” seems to have been just for show.…
Busting an annoying transport myth
One thing that perpetually annoys me is when Steven Joyce rolls out the “we’re spending $1.6 billion on rail in Auckland so please stop complaining about all the money we’re spending on roads.” We see this line being trotted in in some of the Questions and Answers section to the Government Policy Statement:
It is also important to note that the majority of central government funding for public transport infrastructure is provided outside of the National Land Transport Fund and so not included in the GPS.…
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