Time for a quick gripe, could this possibly be the worst footpath in Auckland? Eyeball the left hand side, there the ‘footpath’ is a slip lane entrance to a carparking building being used for parking by courier vans. And the right hand side, the narrowest footpath I have ever seen!

No footpaths either side, but two apartment buildings and plenty of foot traffic…

Here is another view, those buildings on the right are a historic apartment building, next to a modern apartment hotel. They have six carparks between them so obviously most of the residents walk to this buildings. Just out of shot to the right is the headquarters of Fonterra, one of the largest dairy companies in the world. This street sits on the main walking route between these buildings and Queen St. Notice just how ridiculously narrow that footpath is. It’s probably less than a foot wide.

Worlds skinniest footpath?

Yep, closer inspection reveals that this footpath is less wide than my foot. The funny thing is to take this photo I had to put my satchel down to handle the camera. I actually had to align my bag lengthwise to fit it on the footpath.

A footpath less that a foot wide…

So why do we do these things, just a complete historic disregard for pedestrians? I realise it is a pretty tight lane, but surely our traffic engineers and urban designers can do better than this.

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42 comments

  1. Marmion Street is pretty bad.
    http://maps.google.co.nz/?ll=-36.854553,174.763269&spn=0.000004,0.001725&t=m&z=19&layer=c&cbll=-36.854576,174.763365&panoid=JIGF4BjZ5YLA64OmsA_zUQ&cbp=12,95.97,,0,26.17
    Great South Road between Penrose and Otahuhu, starts with a footpath, then goes to just grass and gets narrow beacuse of the over grown trees, then theres a big fence on the edge of the road so you have to walk on the road, well run beacuse with all the trucks going along there you don’t want to be between the truck and fence.

    1. Does Marmion Street even need a footpath? I don’t see a need to direct pedestrians down a street which is only a connection between carparks and Queen St.

      1. Presumably the people in the carparks might be there because they want to get to Queen St? And anyway… there’s a guy in this street view scene who seems to disagree… and who is just about to run out of footpath http://goo.gl/maps/y6ueX

  2. it’s depressing that the first two comments on this post have identified other contenders for Auckland’s worst footpath, i.e. that there are other places that could possibly be worse than this.

  3. Yes there are a few footpaths needing attention but there has been a massive investment in improving footpaths in the cbd and suburbs!!!

    1. Mainly the suburbs … footpaths in the city centre still really struggle to get the level of investment that they deserve given their high levels of foot traffic.

      It’s fascinating catching a bus to Pt Chev and Westmere – the footpaths are generally wide and wonderful, with a reasonable surface quality, but with hardly any use. IMO the city centre is still being relatively neglected compared to outlying suburbs …

  4. The 6 carparks are all there are for those two apartment buildings, the modern one has in fact only a single space for rubbish trucks, yet has 18 floors each with 6 apartments. It’s bad but has so little traffic it is bearable, there are other streets around the city so full of cars and with so little pedestrian amenity that they are much less tolerable.

    1. “Bad” ?

      I would say “completely inappropriate and unsafe”. It’s funny how in previous comments some people have tried to defend the actions of traffic engineers as if the latter were only concerned for “safety”, hence the need for wide lanes, sweeping curves etc.

      I wonder how well this footpath ranks on safety parameters?

    1. Amusing how you can’t even safely get from/to your own car if you park there, although at least it’s only a single narrow vehicle lane and there is a wide footpath on the other side.

      1. Andrew, no intended criticism of your comment, but when you think about it that’s situation normal for car parks, sadly traffic engineers only focus on one mode of travel in car parks, forgetting that every parked car equals at least two pedestrian trips, to and from the car

        I like to think of a car park as a transition zone, where drivers become pedestrians and BOTH need to be catered for, in fact the case could be made that pedestrians should be given higher priority, given their greater vulnerability, particularly the very young and the elderly ones

        the only amusement to be found in relation to car parking is in the black humour quarter!

        1. Yeah I was just mentally comparing that to most other on street parking, which parallels a footpath. I didn’t quite think that through.

          Bunning’s Warehouse have taken an interesting approach to that. I noted today their Hillsborough store has signage in their carpark denoting it as a “shared zone”. This is the first time I’ve noticed such a designation in a carpark, anywhere.

        2. interesting example Andrew, in a place like Bunnings the walk component is emphasised because people are often taking bulky goods back to their car/van/ute, but it does show some increased awareness by a retailer of walking as an important means of access to their business, as opposed to just parking

  5. But wait, there’s more! This is the main pedestrian route up to Highwic from Newmarket:
    http://goo.gl/maps/Imxhp
    It’s about 50cm wide from memory and of course no crossing facilities at that busy intersection either. Thankfully we have managed to fit in 4 lanes for cars.

    1. To be fair, that Greenlane example is the result of widening to build a cycle lane (sort of), and there is a very wide pedestrian path just on the other side of that wall.

    2. there were also significant heritage issues with the stone wall, which determined the design possibilities, a case of resolving conflicting council imperatives

  6. all these references are Not footpaths, people do have brains and don’t attempted to use as footpaths, maybe you guys should try that too

    1. Most of them should have footpaths Patrick. Yes people do use their brains, but they also may have a legitimate reason for being in these locations.

    2. So Patrick, you’re saying if the people staying in that hotel had brains they should never leave the hotel, nor go into it in the first place? Because it is impossible to do so without walking on the “not footpath”, there is simply no other way to access that building.

  7. Plenty of lanes in European cities have narrow paths in narrow streets like that and you walk on the road, the difference I guess is that European drivers are more considerate of pedestrians.

    1. Yes that is very true – Greece in particular has many narrow streets with tiny or non-existent footpaths. We do have more space in our cities than they do though, so here it’s more a matter of priorities than necessity.

      1. Its also true of Italy. The situation pictured in the original post wouldn’t be unusual in any of hundreds of cosmopolitan European towns. People pretend to celebrate this type of urbanism, but then they want to stamp the values of suburban Auckland on it.

        https://maps.google.co.nz/maps?q=Via+del+Grande+V.,+Frascati,+RM,+Italia&hl=en&ll=41.808317,12.679124&spn=0.009181,0.021136&sll=41.808323,12.679115&sspn=0.009245,0.021136&oq=Via+del+grande&t=h&hnear=Via+del+Grande+V.,+Frascati,+Roma,+Lazio,+Italy&z=16&layer=c&cbll=41.808331,12.679268&panoid=aduwsJfhj0nAP6xI_jhZXQ&cbp=12,221.89,,0,6.03 …Not a footpath to be seen anywhere. Essentially the majority of the town is a shared street, except that the vehicles are sharing it at high speed rather than walking pace.

    2. Sure, so I guess my gripe isn’t so much that there isn’t a footpath, but that there is still the road design where cars have full priority on the road lane and pedestrians are still supposed to not walk on the road (quite where there are supposed to go is the issue!).

  8. The slip lanes on this intersection have reduced the footpaths to murderous widths and angles. This intersection needs scaling back, port traffic should not be using this route. And its not just that problem, the entry to the car park is a footpath gobbling nightmare too. Whatever planners at the old council allowed this should be sent to the street sweeping department and made to work on city streets for a few years. No ped crossing on the slip lanes… etc the full bag of auto priority crimes: http://maps.google.co.nz/maps?utm_campaign=en&utm_source=en-ha-apla-nz-google-gm&utm_medium=ha&utm_term=new%20zealand%20road%20map

  9. Auckland Transport has allocated around $3 million per year in the RLTP to construct new footpaths. Local Boards were invited to assist in establishing the new footpath programme for this financial year. Here is the proposal I put in on behalf of the Board for Judges Bay Road extension which came to our attention via the Parnell Baths support group http://www.pippacoom.co.nz/waitemata-local-board/new-footpath-proposal-for-judges-bay-road-access-to-parnell-baths/
    I can make sure AT is aware of these suggestions too (very helpful – thank you) but it looks likely that most of the fund is going to be used for new footpaths in rural areas and on Waiheke.

  10. I think there is big potential here to treat these little lanes like Day St and Bankside as shared spaces. Not necessarily ones with fancy paving, stainless steel rubbish bins and architecturally designed lighting concepts, just low speed lanes without defined footpaths where vehicle drivers and pedestrians have to travel slowly and share the space.

    I’ve seen what looks to be a quite cheap pavement that might be suitable for these applications, I think it is just concrete that is textured to make it look and feel like cobblestones. That should be a cheap set and forget pavement surface that gives people the look and feel cues that they are off the normal roadway and on somewhere a bit different.

    1. Exactly the answer Nick. Even with a change in road markings and some signage would do it along with raised tables at entry points to really emphasise the nature of the area. It’s really no different from driving in a carpark- there you have to assume there will be pedestrians anywhere. Shared spaces do not have to have top end finishes to still function.

  11. Comments have been made to “the massive investment” in new footpaths throughout the city and suburbs.The suburban footpath programme initiated under the C&R/Banks ACC administration, which saw vast swathes of footpath concreted over in marginal wards has to be one of the most environmentally damaging undertakings by the former council: these slabs have diminished ground water absorption, increased runoff flows and, due to the schizoid nature of the privatised/pre-privatized infrastructure service companies, led to the same piece of slab being laid and dug up and replaced repeatedly. Where they’re needed, ie where shared spaces are impractical, good footpaths should protect pedestrians from passing traffic but not at the cost of further environmental damage.

    1. And now all, and I mean all, are being ripped up for the Ultra Fast Broadband that few seem to be able to afford. An extraordinary failure to coordinate because of an ideological obsession against planning by absurd cartoon politicians with 1984 mindsets: Banks and Joyce. [unless it’s for new highways, but of course they aren’t really planned either, but built on a whim of the hybrid Muldoonist/neoliberal Joyce]

    2. That describes exactly what had happened at my old place on the edge of Newmarket, although this was this year (might still have been part of the same scheme though)

      Set down those slabs, but because there is a little lip on the edge of the slab right by our front enterence, we’ve ended up with a load of water going straight on to the property. To add insult to injury, because they’d ripped up all the grass and relaid it, it meant that it just washed the topsoil straight in there too.

      On top of that too, when St Peters decided to rip up their field and put astroturf down, all the footpath was done except for the bit outside their field which is just destroyed.

      Awesome work Auckland council!

  12. Kent St in Newmarket is pretty bad too. Compared to other examples the footpath is actually existent and not that much narrower (!) – but compare it to the vast area devoted to cars, just outside a carpark building I might add: http://goo.gl/maps/oaOyi

  13. Oh, and could this be Auckland’s narrowest and most misplaced shared path? http://goo.gl/maps/b6q68 You can’t tell from looking at the Street View, but here you will find a shared pedestrian/cycle path symbol painted between the building on the left and dotted yellow lines…

  14. Walkers are Auckland’s forgotten commuters. Over the past few years in our street garden foliage and hedges have steadily reduced the usable width of the footpaths outside some houses by 50-80%, cars park over driveways, tree branches overhang so you need to stoop and roots uplift the paving making the surface uneven. Doubt this would be acceptable if it were a road.

    I love the leafy environment, but if we want to encourage people out of their cars we could do a bit more on this. Maybe Council notices in their newletter to remind neighbours to tidy up would be a start.

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